6-10 Dec 2020
Filmmaker in Focus : Sandhya Kumar
Sandhya Kumar is an independent filmmaker based in Bangalore, India. A film and communications graduate of San Francisco Art Institute and Jamia Millia University, New Delhi, her work is rooted in non-fiction and inspired by the desire to make visible the poetry of everyday life. Her 2012 documentary, ‘O Friend, This Waiting!’ won the Indian National Film Award for Best Arts/Cultural Film, for its unconventional exploration of the Devadasi tradition in South India through the medium of love-poetry. She had received film grants from the India Foundation for the Arts (IFA) and the Public Service Broadcasting Trust (PSBT) and has been an ATSA fellow at ARThink South Asia.
Sandhya has worked as an assistant director with artist Amar Kanwar on the film and art installation, The Lightning Testimonies, and as a visual arts curator for the Red Poppy Art House, San Francisco, and Mocha Art House, New Delhi. She is a trustee of Vikalp Bengaluru, a filmmakers’ collective committed to creating platforms for documentary films to reach wider audiences. She also conducts workshops and training sessions on the filmmaking process for learners of all levels.
Selected Filmography
2018
Koothu - Direction, Editing
52 min. HD. Produced by PSBT
A film about a rural theatre tradition and changing audiences
2015
Hockey In My Blood - Direction, Editing
54 min, HD
About the world’s largest hockey tournament, played between family clans of Coorg in India
2014
Memory of a Light - Direction, Editing
26 min, HD, Produced by PSBT
A visual essay on nostalgia for the childhood house
2012
O Friend, This Waiting! - Direction, Editing
32 min, HDV, Funded by the India Foundation for the Arts.
A film on the entwined fortunes of temple love songs from 17th century South India and the devadasi-courtesans who performed them
2009
Filmmaker in Focus : Sandhya Kumar
Sandhya Kumar is an independent filmmaker based in Bangalore, India. A film and communications graduate of San Francisco Art Institute and Jamia Millia University, New Delhi, her work is rooted in non-fiction and inspired by the desire to make visible the poetry of everyday life. Her 2012 documentary, ‘O Friend, This Waiting!’ won the Indian National Film Award for Best Arts/Cultural Film, for its unconventional exploration of the Devadasi tradition in South India through the medium of love-poetry. She had received film grants from the India Foundation for the Arts (IFA) and the Public Service Broadcasting Trust (PSBT) and has been an ATSA fellow at ARThink South Asia.
Sandhya has worked as an assistant director with artist Amar Kanwar on the film and art installation, The Lightning Testimonies, and as a visual arts curator for the Red Poppy Art House, San Francisco, and Mocha Art House, New Delhi. She is a trustee of Vikalp Bengaluru, a filmmakers’ collective committed to creating platforms for documentary films to reach wider audiences. She also conducts workshops and training sessions on the filmmaking process for learners of all levels.
Selected Filmography
2018
Koothu - Direction, Editing
52 min. HD. Produced by PSBT
A film about a rural theatre tradition and changing audiences
2015
Hockey In My Blood - Direction, Editing
54 min, HD
About the world’s largest hockey tournament, played between family clans of Coorg in India
2014
Memory of a Light - Direction, Editing
26 min, HD, Produced by PSBT
A visual essay on nostalgia for the childhood house
2012
O Friend, This Waiting! - Direction, Editing
32 min, HDV, Funded by the India Foundation for the Arts.
A film on the entwined fortunes of temple love songs from 17th century South India and the devadasi-courtesans who performed them
2009
Light Falling on White Flowers - Direction, Editing
15 min. DV.
A film on Isadora Duncan’s internal journey of discovering the ‘modern dance’
2008
15 min. DV.
A film on Isadora Duncan’s internal journey of discovering the ‘modern dance’
2008
I Cannot Remember My Mother - Direction, Camera, Editing
4 min. 16mm. colour. silent.
I search the patterns on the silken threads of a sari, hoping to rebuild one glance of my mother
2007
4 min. 16mm. colour. silent.
I search the patterns on the silken threads of a sari, hoping to rebuild one glance of my mother
2007
The Lightning Testimonies - Assistant Direction
120 min. DV, Directed by Amar Kanwar
120 min. DV, Directed by Amar Kanwar
A documentary feature on narratives of sexual violence in the public sphere in the Indian sub-continent
