TAGORE IN SPAIN

While Rabindranath Tagore, the greatest of Indian poets and the first Asian to get the Nobel Prize (1913), has now been virtually forgotten in the entire Western world, he is still passionately remembered in Spain and Latin America. Children recite his poems, poets discuss him in cafes, flamenco singers in Andalucia as well as rock singers in Latin America use Tagore’s lyrics. This is all the more surprising because Tagore has never been translated into Spanish from the original Bengali and a mere 10% of his works exist in Spanish. 

The Objective is to revive Tagore's popularity among the younger generation and raise his profile in the Spanish-speaking world by revealing the contemporary relevance of his literary and artistic works. 

THE EVENT

The varied cultural manifestations around Tagore in the Spanish world will be brought together on one common platform in three Spanish cities – Barcelona, Salamanca and Valladolid.  It will be a two-day event in every city filled with discussions, paper presentations, poetry readings, music, dance and art, highlighting the different facets of Tagore’s genius, many of which are not known in Spain or elsewhere. The programme in each of the three cities will have a unique character in its interfacing of local culture with some of the leading Tagore specialists who will travel to the conference from India and other parts of the world. 

Tagore in Spain is being targeted at the youth, seeking to change the conventional stereotype of Tagore as an “Oriental mystic” to that of a true internationalist who was politically engaged, constantly in dialogue with other disciplines and one who speaks to us today not only through his poetry but also plays, novels, music and painting. 

·              SCHEDULE

UNIVERSITY OF SALAMANCA: 27^th and 28th 

Sept, 2011

BARCELONA : 30^th Sept and 1st Oct, 2011

Venue: Casa Asia

VALLADOLID: 3^rd  and 4^th October, 2011

Venue: Casa de la India 

·           LIST OF EVENTS 

1. Seminars:  Tagore’s presence in Spain  will be organised with local specialists on Tagore along with some international scholars such as Prof. S.P. Ganguly, William Radice, José Paz, Emilia Cortes, Agus Morales Puga, etc. The second part of this seminar would be titled  Translating Tagore: Translation as  Interpretation  (where translators and poets  will deal with the challenges & problems in translating Tagore into Spanish).
2. Readings, Recitations, Music: Parallel readings in Spanish, English and Bengali of a selection of Tagore's poetry. This would be the first-ever contact between Spanish and Bengali through Tagore. The highlight of this session will be a special presentation and performance of Rabindrasangeet (Tagore’s songs) by one of its finest exponents (Swagatalakshmi Dasgupta) who will demonstrate how Tagore had often drawn upon western melody and other musical genres and then transformed them in his own way. It  will include Maria Villares, a Cuban musicianwho uses Tagore’s lyrics and a young classical composer, Mariaelena Pena de Prada who does variations of Tagorean melody on theclassical guitar. 
3. Tagore as Choreographer: Lecture and performance on the eclectic dance form evolved by Tagore, his ideas about choreography and its contemporary relevance. This will be a lecture presentation followed by a live performance by dance scholar and performer Dr. Ananya Chatterjea, Director of the Dance Programme, Theatre Arts and Dance, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, USA.
4. Tagore as Painter: Mumbai-based art scholar and philosopher, Prof. Prabodh Parikh, will outline Tagore’s contribution to modern Indian art. The talk will be visually accompanied by Tagore’s paintings.
5. Tagore and Cinema: The first day’s session will end with the screening of Satyajit Ray’s ‘Charulata’ (1964) based on a Tagore’s novella and the second day will end with Rituparno Ghosh’s latest film, ‘Noukadubi’ (2011). These films will be  subtitled in Spanish for this occasion and seen in the Spanish world for the first time. Indranil Chakravarty, professor of cinema and Convenor of the event, will introduce the films, highlighting the relationship between Tagore and cinema.
6. Tagore and the Theatre:  One of India's top theatre experts - Prof Samik. Bandopadhyay - will make an elaborate presentation about how different theatre directors across the world and particularly in India, have interpreted Tagore's plays on the stage. This will also include Tagore's own theatre productions. The talk will be accompanied by very rare production stills and videos of staged plays.
7. Publications in Spanish: Two publications are being currently prepared in Spanish – one would be a collection of major critical works on Tagore translated into Spanish for the first time along with an exhaustive Spanish bibliography and filmography. This book, titled “Redescubriendo a Tagore” / Rediscovering Tagore (eds. Indranil Chakravarty & Prof. S.P. Ganguly) will also include some of the seminar presentations and is being published by the Spanish embassy in New Delhi. The other publication will be a selection of Tagore’s writings for children in Spanish.
8. Tagore and Gandhi: The Tagore-Gandhi debate is one of the most fascinating debates in history, not only in India but anywhere else. Two of the greatest personalities of the 20^th century had immense respect for each other but thoroughly disagreed on several issues, particularly with regard to the question of cultural identity, interpretation of history and most importantly, their ideas about the validity of nationalism. Prof. Prabodh Parikh, an expert in this area, will make a presentation on this topic along with the screening of a film. This event will coincide with Gandhi’s birthday on Oct 2. 
9. Exhibition of Tagore’s books in Spanish: Mr. Jose Paz, the major collectionist of Tagore publications, has agreed to do an exhibition of all the major Tagore books in Spanish, from the earliest ones in 1914 till date.
10. Documentary: The entire event will be made into a documentary on high-end digital video with a multi-camera set-up along with individual interviews, event build-up and street scenes to highlight Tagore’s position in Spanish life. The film will be made into a one-hour long film that will be distributed on DVD that will help disseminate this unique event around the world with multi-language subtitles. This will be carried out through a coproduction arrangement between Whistling Woods International Film Institute in Mumbai and NIC, a major film school in Madrid.

·              COLLABORATING ORGANISATIONS 

1. ILACI (Indo-Latin American Cultural Initiative), Mumbai                                         [Initiator, developer, fundraiser and partial sponsor of the  project. ILACI is providing leadership to the project.]
2. The Curatorial Bureau, Madrid  [Coordinator in Spain]
3. Casa Asia – House of Asian Culture, Barcelona 
4. Embassy of Spain in India, New Delhi
5. University of Salamanca
6. Casa de la India, Valladolid
7. University of Barcelona, Barcelona
8. Ministry of Culture, Govt. of India
9. Indian Council of Cultural Relations
10. Whistling Woods International Film Institute, Mumbai
11. NIC (Film Institute), Madrid

Recent ILACI Events

NEXT- GLOBAL SHORTS 

Also:  http://ilacieng.blogspot.in/2012/07/next-global-shorts.html

AMARANTA LIBROS 

TAGORE IN SPAIN  
Also see the Facebook page 

FTII-EICTV Coproduction Contract


ILACI has negotiated and finally executed (in October, 2009) the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding between Film and Television Institute of India (FTII) in Pune, India and Escuela Internacional de Cine y TV (EICTV) in Havana, Cuba in relation to the regular exchange of faculty, students and coproduction of student films. It has also signed a coproduction contract and the directors of both the institutes are scheduled to visit each other in 2011. The first coproduction has been initiated. It is a multi-lingual documentary series called 'Ser un Ser Humano' / 'To Be a Human Being' where six young filmmakers from across six countries in the six continents try to understand what it means to be human in today's world. They would probe this compelling question through a specific community of their choice. ILACI is the supervisor and guide on the project. The FTII student-filmmaker selected for this project is Ms. Sreya Chatterjee. She travelled to  EICTV in Havana for masterclasses on the documentary (directed by the Australian filmmaker, Russell Porter)  and has completed shooting in Calcutta, among a community of idol-makers in Kumartuli.  

UNESCO  Asian Documentary Workshop 


ILACI organised in early April 2010, a 6-day international workshop for Asian documentary filmmakers which imparted skills and resources in relation to accessing European funds for making films on Indian subjects. The workshop was hosted by Whistling Woods International Institute of Film & Media Arts in Mumbai's Film City and was supported by UNESCO d'Igualada in Spain. It was conducted by the Dutch filmmaker Wiek Lenssen who had earlier made several films in Latin America and shared that experience with the participants. 

Ongoing ILACI Projects

• Ser un Ser Humano / To Be a Human Being : This is a  documentary feature coproduction involving six major film schools in six different continents. Through this documentary, we are trying to explore what it means to be a human being in the 21st century across cultures and civilizations that are apparently distinct and diverse. While ILACI is one of the production guides and coproducers, the project is being led by EICTV (Cuba). Among the other partners are CUNY, Red Sea  Institute of Cinematic Arts in Jordan, NIC in Spain, etc. The Indian segment is being directed by Ms. Sreya Chatterjee, a current student of editing at FTII (Film & TV Institute of India, Pune) and is being financed by FTII. The 3-hour long film will be ready by the end of 2011. 

• 'India From The Inside': This is a series of six in-depth documentaries  by different Indian filmmakers about India for Western audiences, produced by the Dutch filmmaker Wiek Lenssen and financed by a network of European TV channels. This project is now in development.  ILACI is the producer from India. 

• Chiapas Media Project in India: ILACI has entered into an agreement to disseminate the videos of the Chiapas Media Project in India on non-commercial basis. CMP/ Promedios is an award winning, bi-national partnership that provides video equipment, computers and training enabling marginalized indigenous communities in Southern Mexico (specifically, the Zapatista communities in Chiapas) to create their own media.  Alexandra Halkin is the Founding Director/International Coordinator of the project. 
  
  These videos, made since 1998, deal with agricultural collectives, fair trade coffee, women’s collectives, autonomous education, traditional healing and the history of their struggle for land. These 6000 indigenously produced videos have been screened at universities, museums, and film and video festivals worldwide.
  According to Ms. Halkin, the idea of the CMP came from an Indian video on micro-credits and empowerment of women and now these CMP videos carry a lot of resonance for India. Any request for screening of these videos in India can be sent to Indranil Chakravarty.