Made for the Venice Film Festival's 70th anniversary, seventy filmmakers made a short film between 60 and 90 seconds long on their interpretation of the future of cinema.
Kumar Gandharav, a child prodigy who subsequently became one of the finest and most original geniuses of Indian classical music, was struck by tuberculosis at the height of his abilities. For years, he lay in bed, barred from using his lungs, unsure if he would ever be able to rise or sing again....
The film is based on and inspired from the tinted brush drawings, sketches and some finished yet minimalistic works of the 18th century master miniature painter Nainsukh. Even in some of his finished paintings, the artist did not hide his corrections and afore-thoughts, which he allowed to show...
Amit Dutta recorded several conversations with Prof. B.N. Goswamy, an important art historian of India, covering his entire body of work. Interspersed with his talks were also some silences. This film draws upon some of those moments of silence and weaves them into a web of ideas and images that...
The film juxtaposes two journeys, one in search of the name of a Pahari painter lost in genealogical registers, and the other in search of a lake once called the eighth wonder of the world.
In ‘Abhagir Swargo’ the mother Abhaghi is a lower caste woman, whose only dream was that after her death she should be cremated with full rituals like the high-caste Hindus. She dies in penury and his son went further into the debt trap to fulfill his mother’s last wish.
Mother, Who Will Weave Now? attempts to sample and mirror the grand tapestry of Indian textile tradition and history by interweaving snippets of Indian cloth on an editing table, using the poetic meters of classical Indian literature sewn together with the words and motifs of the weaver-saint Kabir.
The 18th-century Indian painter Nainsukh of Guler receives a poetic, visually stunning tribute from a young Indian filmmaker employing an arresting pictorial language. Shot in the region where Nainsukh produced his most celebrated work, this is a meditative and meticulous recreation of the world of...
An homage to the influential practice and philosophy of artist Nasreen Mohamedi. The film incorporates Mohamedi’s personal notes and her unique singular vision, drawing upon the aesthetics of the bare line, and its metaphysical journey eliminating physical borders/barriers.
The Many Interrupted Dreams of Mr. Hemmady explores the unintentional and fantastical narratives contained within matchbox art, delving into the interplay of dreams, desires, and histories, presenting them as a chaotic yet meaningful mosaic of knowledge and wisdom, all while embracing the...
The Ashokan rock-edict in a remote Himalayan village has the last fragment of a script only decipherable by few experts. Some miles away in Shimla, the art-historian V.C.Ohri, who uncovered the origins and techniques of Pahari paintings, warmly welcomes visitors. He is meeting them for the very...
A film on the art of the revered Indian painter Jamini Roy (1887-1972). Could we reach out to nature through his seemingly flat colours and establish the diversity in this uniformity? A Thousand Colours of Jamini Roy explores the intricate world of modern artist Jamini Roy’s natural pigments and...
The 18th century Pahari miniatures illustrating the verses of 'Gita Govinda' by the poet Jayadeva, are also loving and intimate portraits of the verdant landscape of the Kangra Valley. Nature becomes a primary actor and the director focuses on the alchemy of the 'transformation of nature in art.'
Synopsis:An eighteenth century notebook from the Western Himalayan Hills has recorded in it dreams as omens. Scenes from the waking memory of the artist seem to have enlivened dreams from a bygone era. Coming from the family ateliers of the master painter Nainsukh of Guler, this journal of dreams...
How do the vicissitudes of contemporary notions of nationhood alter our relationship with cultural patrimony? It’s a question obliquely suggested by Amit Dutta’s latest film. As a camera explores the architecture of a museum, we hear a description of a painting we never see. Eventually, we...
Towards the end of the eighth century, an architect journeys across the lower Himalayas in search of the perfect site for constructing a temple, not merely as a place of worship but as a monumental record crystallizing the collective accomplishment of a civilization.
