A collaborative film-making workshop with Kamal Swaroop
05 September to 04 October 2020 (total 30 days)
17 online days and 13 homework+production days
Online timings: 14:30 to 18:30 IST.
Overview:
“There must be a hint .…..of that most terrible conception of the human brain—a malign and particular suspension or defeat of those fixed laws of Nature which are our only safeguard against the assaults of chaos and the demons of unplumbed space.” (Lovecraft, 1927)
The workshop with Kamal Swaroop will attempt to peep into the unplumbed spaces and notice who hides in the corners and crevices. Participants will be encouraged to drop their defence and confront the silent starring void, the abyss, the deep darkness, beyond comprehension, beyond the human touch, beyond the warmth of love and light…. the flip side of our being. The shadow. In our lonely, distorted, disgruntled dungeon-world, the fabulous terrifying phantoms rise…
At the edge of consciousness, transgressing the order and stepping in chaos, in the reign of the dark and the deceptive, the workshop will visit the ghosts that visit us. The haunting is triggered by the invisible evil tricksters of the pandemic and aggravated by prolonged lockdown and terror of touch.The central character that the workshop will explore will be ‘the incarcerated being’ and the predominant state ‘the solitary confinement’. Around the central character and the state, the participants will have to make their own ghost films under the mentorship of Kamal Swaroop.
Experiments with the dark will enlighten us!
The workshop is for those above 18 years of age – interested in cinema, psyche and ghost stories.
Maximum number of participants – 30
Workshop fee: INR 9500 (inclusive of all taxes)
Scholarships may be considered in exceptional cases. 3 seats reserved for Aurovilians.
Workshop Time Frame:
05 September to 03 October 2020 (total 30 days)
17 online days and 13 homework+production days
Online timings: 14:30 to 18:30 IST.
Detailed Breakup of Workshop time:
05 to 07 September 2020; 14:30 to 18:30 IST
2 days of Introduction and Orientation
12 to 27 September 2020
Main sessions – (includes lectures, screenings, interactions and exercises)
interspersed with homework days.
28 September to 01 October 2020;
Production days (individually mentored)
02 to 04 October 2020
Workshop film screenings,discussions and closing celebration.
Detailed schedule can be provided upon request.
LAST CALL FOR APPLICATION: open till 04th September 2020
Selected applicants will be notified within a day.
Those selected will be requested to pay the fees before 05 September 2020 – 12 noon.
Participation will be confirmed upon verification of payment.
Introduction and orientation sessions will be held with all confirmed participants on 5th and 6th September. Study material (reading and viewing list) will be shared then. Participants will be expected to study before they join the online sessions of the workshop beginning from 15th September 2020.
Workshop Director : Kamal Swaroop
Kamal Swaroop is a two time President’s award and Filmfare Award winning film, television and radio director and screenwriter. In 1974 he graduated from the Film and Television Institute of India and even his student works met with unusual international acclaim. He continued with postgraduate studies at the Institute. In 1982, he assisted Sir Richard Attenborough in the filming of Gandhi. Om-Dar-B-Dar (1988) is his path breaking masterpiece. Kamal’s career, spanning 42 years, covers a broad range of films, channel promos for Channel V India, ads and Radio Spots.
Kamal Swaroop’s mentorshop and creative direction will hold the participants’ individual
narratives together. Kamal will weave the individual stories of the participants into a larger
story of the film, giving it a distinct direction. With his bold, preposterous and rather disruptive film language, Kamal will be able to device rather unusual view of ‘the new normal’. Kamal has also been an influential teacher to generations of filmmakers from mainstream to alternative. He has produced an iconic film ‘Tracing Phalke’ in a workshop modality of his own. Kamal’s mentorship will inspire participants to re-imagine ‘the Ghost’.
Additional Faculty:
Hansa Thapliyal, alumna of Film and Television Institute of India, is a film maker, writer and teacher, currently based in Bangalore. Her latest work being a series of short fiction stories on the history of early Indian cinema, for the Phalke project; a chap book of her writings has been published by an experimental press in Australia. Over the past decade, she has worked with material to look for ways to give the digital image a more tactile presence, finding ways in which the image can return us to the tactile pleasure of the world.
This desire has guided her teaching ( she has done workshops talking about the sensory, the sensual, with young people for Agents of Ishq and Point of View, has taught film full time and occasionally, textile, at the Srishti School of Art, Design and Technology). She has tried to integrate stop motion animation into her film work. Hansa is currently exploring the hidden self playfully through doll-making ! ‘The Outside In’ her latest documentary on two doll makers, curated on MUBI and exhibited at the Mumbai International Film Festival explores inner ambiguities and how their release.
Richa Hushing & Rrivu Laha are documentary filmmakers, both alumni of Film and Television Institute of India, Pune. Richa specializes in Direction and Editing, while Rrivu’s specialization is Direction and Cinematography. Their films are often character portraits; and portraits of indigenous cultures in face of conflict and at the threshold of change. Cinema verité style is their strength.
‘Nicobar, a long way…’ a documentary observing Nicobarese identity and resilience in wake of state sponsored relief and rehabilitation post Tsunami – is one of their latest works, winning international acclaim.
After a decade-long practice based in Mumbai, in 2017 Richa and Rrivu moved to Auroville, an intentional international township dedicated to the ideals of human unity, free progress and transformation of consciousness. In Auroville, they’ve found Auroville Timelines, a media pedagogy and video arts unit, researching and curating recorded memories of Auroville, creating mnemonics of the dream.
Richa and Rrivu have also co-founded ‘Auroville Film Institute’ dedicated to the ideal of cinema education, integrating world cinema and world citizenship, experimenting with a new pedagogy, encouraging new practices of conscious cinema. Auroville Film Institute has begun to offer short term courses; and is preparing for long term plans, individualised mentorship, student exchange programmes and cinema-centric learning journeys.
Copyrights:
This is a collaborative film making workshop. The participants will hold the copyrights of the individual films they produce as a part of the workshop. Auroville Film Institute reserves all rights to the collaborative film produced using excerpts of the films and footage generated through the workshop with due credits to the collaborators and contributors.
Certificates: Those who wish for certificates will be given digital certificates of participation. Completion of production is mandatory to receive certificates.
Queries:
For queries, if any, please write to:
filminstitute@auroville.org.in or call / message on +91 9969879319.
filminstitute.auroville.org 