IFA@Bangalore: Scaling Artistic Altitudes with Bhamati Sivapalan, Garima Gupta, Srishti Lakhera | March 06, 2025 | The Chancery Pavilion, Bangalore
Join us on a special evening where three artists speak about their projects in the lower Himalayas, as part of the Explorations category of our Arts Practice programme.
Explorations as a category encourages artists to play around with new ideas and go through unprecedented artistic journeys, experiences and processes. Bhamati Sivapalan, Garima Gupta and Srishti Lakhera individually made their way through the Himalayas, researching into the region to collect stories of the landscape and its communities. Each took a different vantage point: Bhamati, through science fiction and storyboarding, traced the collective memories of the erstwhile dwellers of Old Tehri town which went under water after the construction of a dam, while Garima experimented with making an artist book in the form of a dragon-scale scroll containing micro-narratives of the Mahakali River as a site of spirituality and cross-border trade. Srishti went on a search for Yarshagumba, a Himalayan medicinal mushroom harvested by the pastoral Rung community. She studied the shifts in their narratives as they move between two worlds: one with digital networks and the other with oral traditions and myths, with the Yarshagumba as the nodal point.
Together, they showcase how their artistic explorations through the real Himalayas are enlightened by the imaginary of speculative fiction, critical fabulation, and folklore. They will also be in conversation with John Xaviers, Programme Officer, Arts Practice, IFA.
Scaling Artistic Altitudes: Explorations in the Lower Himalayas
Date and Time: March 06, 2025 | 07:30 PM IST
Venue: The Chancery Pavilion, Bangalore
The event is free, open to all and has Indian Sign Language interpretation. People requiring the interpretation are requested to be seated in the front row.
Bhamati is a Bangalore-based filmmaker and editor, with a degree in Mass Communication from AJK Mass Communication Research Centre, Jamia Millia Islamia, Delhi. She was the co-producer and editor of the national-award winning documentary film Ek Tha Gaon.
Garima is a Delhi-based contemporary artist who studied at the National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad. She has been to many artist residencies including Mittal Institute, Harvard University, and Tentacles Arts Space, Bangkok. She was nominated for the Signature Art Prize 2018, Singapore Art Museum.
Srishti is an ethnographic documentary filmmaker. Her debut documentary film Ek Tha Gaon (Once Upon a Village), has won over a dozen awards, including the John Abraham Award and The Best Film and Best Audiography at the 69th National Film Awards. She has directed and produced films for international organisations, government bodies, and national and international television.
This session is organised as part of Project Showcase@IFA, a series of presentations to showcase, discuss and engage audiences with the diverse projects we support and implement across programmes.
Image Courtesy: Bhamati Sivapalan, Srishti Lakhera and Garima Gupta
The projects were made possible with support from Sony Pictures Entertainment Fund and Parijat Foundation.