Shirley Abraham: Revolution in a Minor Key

“The air is a hunting machine,” writes Arundhati Roy. A diagnosis, and a prophecy for many democracies in the world. With the independent voice silenced all around, and most people in the world living in autocracies now, how can one imagine fugitive spaces for speaking? For thinking, feeling and creating? What is the language of work that may not be allowed to be made? Independent filmmaker Shirley Abraham’s work examines freedom of speech and expression as the beating heart of the independent voice. Her talk will grapple with the architecture of censorship, and a counter infrastructure of resistance — through structures of relating and feeling. She will share visual and oral narratives that offer a pathway into freedom of thought as a political, cinematic and philosophical question. Shirley Abraham is a Cannes prize-winning Indian documentary filmmaker. Her work sits between poetic expression and urgent political enquiry. Her films include The Cinema Travellers (2016), Searching for Saraswati (2018), The Hour of Lynching (2019) and The Great Abandonment (2021). Her work is supported by the Sundance Institute, Pulitzer Center, MacArthur Foundation, Points North Institute, InMaat Foundation, Lannan Foundation, Chicken & Egg, Field of Vision, the New York Times, the Guardian, IDFA Bertha Fund and Catapult Film Fund, among others. She has received the National Film Award in India and numerous international honours and fellowships. Most recently, she was a documentary film fellow at Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. Shirley is a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Image: Pir ki Gali (“the path of the saints”), a high mountain pass in the Himalayas. Credit: Tihany Sengupta RSVP Agnes Bendik at YmVuZGlrYWcgfCBjZXUgISBlZHU=