**Los Angeles Filmforum** presents *Experimentations: Imag(in)ing Knowledge in Film, program 15: This Bit of That India*.

In-person: Curator Shai Heredia.

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The history of experimental film in India is tied to the history of India’s quest for modernity and is particularly visible in the experimental films on science and technology produced by the Films Division of India during the cultural revolution of the late 60’s and early 70’s. Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister was committed to building modern temples i.e., industry powered by science & technology, which he believed would propel Indians towards a Soviet style trajectory of building a socialist utopia. Nehru was confident that science and technology would solve numerous social problems and regenerate a tradition-bound Indian society. Under his leadership, the government established the Indian Institutes of Science, Indian Space Research Organisation, Indian Institutes of Technology, multiple research centres, Universities and cultural institutions across the country. These institutions were expected to be risk taking, experimental, and critical.

This program will showcase a selection of these avant-garde state supported films that reflect the radical values, perspectives and ideas that shaped the vision of Indian democracy. These films remind us of the complexity of early post-colonial Indian modernism as was illustrated in scientist Homi Bhabha’s legendary statement, “It is true that India neither produced the motorcar, the refrigerator, the airplane. Nor did it manufacture these in the overwhelming quantities of other industrialized countries. But for hundreds of years when the Indian peasant did not have to work, he sat in the shade of a tree and thought. He thought the philosophy of truth in life, and he thought as an artist in action.” – Shai Heredia

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Film lineup and program notes at:

https://www.filmforumexperimentations.org/events

Curated by Shai Heredia.

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**Shai Heredia** is a filmmaker, curator, and founding director of Experimenta, the moving image art biennial of India. She has curated film programs and exhibitions worldwide including the Berlin International Film Festival, Tate Modern in London, and she was the programmer of the 65th Robert Flaherty Seminar. Heredia has co-directed *I Am Micro* (2012) and *An Old Dog’s Diary* (2015) with Shumona Goel. Her latest book *One Film at a Time* has been published by Arsenal Institut for Film and Video Art. Heredia is currently the co-curator of Berlinale Forum Expanded. She is based in Bangalore, India where she teaches film and contemporary art practice at the Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology.

This is an 18+ event

Presented by LA Filmforum

2220 Arts

LA Filmforum: This Bit of That India

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