True Blue, Movie Screening and Discussion with Director Swati Dandekar
Bangalore, India-based
filmmaker, Swati Dandekar, will be visiting several Upstate New York campuses
on September 9-10, 2019 to screen her film Neeli Raag (True Blue), which highlights the few surviving craftsmen who
still work with natural indigo. Dandekar’s visit is supported by the
Cornell-Syracuse South Asia Consortium, which is a U.S. Department of Education
Title VI National Resource Center. 
Traversing the verdant monsoon
of Tamil Nadu, the earthy expanses of springtime Telangana, and the wintry
desert of Kachchh, the film is an attempt to tell the story of indigo as it is
practiced in India today. Interwoven with the narratives of the indigo
craftsmen is the color itself in its many moods textures and forms. This is a
blue that deepens, mesmerizes, stains, and seeps into the skin and nails,
indeed into the lives of those who craft it.
Swati Dandekar is documentary filmmaker and film educator
based in Bangalore, India, with a special interest in creating visual
narratives of the living history around her; of people, places, ideas,
traditions, practices, and the continuous process of change. Her film
"Water and a City" was widely screened in India and abroad, and is
part of the curriculum for courses in water management and development studies.
In addition, she has been closely involved with designing media for education.
As a founder trustee of Vikalp Bengaluru, she has been actively screening
documentary films and curating festivals in Bangalore city for over ten
years. Swati heads the Film program at
the Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bangalore.
In addition to screening the documentary at Cornell Cinema on Monday, September 9 at
7 pm, the Consortium has also arranged for her to screen the film at three
local community colleges:
- Onondaga Community College, Monday, September 9 @ 11:15
am, Mawhiney Hall 345
- Tompkins Cortland Community College, Tuesday, September
10, 11:15 am, in the Forum, and
- Monroe Community College, Tuesday, September 10,
6:00 pm, MCC Theater (Building 4)
These events are a part of the
Consortium’s on-going outreach to and collaboration with area community
colleges, with the goal of helping these institutions integrate South Asia into
their curriculum and through on-campus events.
For more information, please contact Kathi Colen Peck (ksc32@cornell.edu).