A Photo Exhibition: “World War I & the Colonies” will be held on November 7, 2014 from 9.30am-5.30pm at School of Social Sciences Foyer, University of Hyderabad
Exhibition “War & Colonies, 1914-1918” by Alliance Française of Hyderabad
This exhibition will reveal the untold or at least largely forgotten stories of the Indian soldiers who fought in the First World War. Undivided India provided Britain with a massive volunteer army in its hour of need. Close to 1.5million Indians servedin all the major locations of the war, from Flanders fields to the Mesopotamian oil fields of what is now Iraq. In total, at least 74,187 Indian soldiers died in this WWI. The photographs of these soldiers are being put at the center stage for the very first time all over India. These photographs will now be on display in Hyderabad.
This exhibition is curated by Olivier Litvine, ex-director of Alliance Française of Dhaka, on February 2014. War and Colonies, 1914-1918″ has received the official label of the Centenary of the WWI
For more information about the exhibition, please visit http://warandcolonies.com/.
Inauguration: Friday 7th of November, at 9.30am @ University of Hyderabad, School of Social Sciences
On View: from Tuesday, 11th of November, till Monday 17th November, between 10am to 5pm @ Alliance Française Hyderabad Gallery, 3rd floor.
November 7, 2014, 4-30-5.30 pm Conference Hall, School of Social Sciences, University of Hyderabad Film Screening:“BECAUSE WE DID NOT CHOOSE”
Wanphrang K Diengdoh
Brief introduction to the presentation:
This audio visual presentation is about the people of Meghalaya involved and caught in between the 1 World War and local and national identities. It includes research, footage and archival material for Wanphrang K Diengdoh’s upcoming film ‘Because we did not choose’. The film is an attempt to look at histories of tribal people involved in an event far away from home. It also looks at the effects of war on people who are not directly involved with it – for example, the German Salvatorian Missionaries and their deportation from the North East. In addition, how imperial India conscripted people from tribal communities to form the Labour Corps and support British war efforts.
Testimonies of some of the people who went to war are captured in photographs, journals, letters, or stories which are narrated by their children. Apart from being a film that seeks to express a past event, it also addresses memory and examines evidence as elements of a complex web of a historical imagination.
Diengdoh will be present to discuss his previous films and his current projects with the audience.
ABOUT THE DIRECTOR
Wanphrang K Diengdoh is a media practitioner based between Delhi and Shillong. He finished his Masters in Mass Communication from JamiaMilliaIslamia and has a certificate in Film and the Historical Imagination from The James Beveridge Media Resource Centre. He was Awarded First class with Second position from the North Eastern Hill University in his undergraduate programme in Mass Communications and Video Production.
He is the founder of ‘red dur’ a production space for films, music and design. Diengdoh’s films, including 19/87 (Best Film, Best Cinematography and Best Screenplay at the Gauhati International Film Festival 2011, official selection IDSFFK, Kerela 2011), Kali Kamai installation (based on Shillong local taxis and the idea of public space funded by the fellowship received from the Public Arts Grant, Foundation For Indian Contemporary Arts, 2010), Where the Clouds End, his current film on the World War 1 as well as his music videos, reflect a keen interest in the politics and culture of Shillong, Meghalaya.
Diengdoh is a self taught musician and also produces music for Tarik, an audio-visual music project based in Delhi and Shillong. In 2013, Diengdoh was also awarded the prestigious Early Career Film Fellowship from the Tata Institute of Social Sciences. In 2014, his installation – Kali Kamai was a semifinalist at the Middle Eastern and Central Asian region selected by the International Award for Public Art (IAPA, based in Hong Kong, USA, China) in the Middle Eastern and Central Asian region. He has spoken and screened his films at various academic and cultural centres including Cambridge University, The United Nations World Urban Forum, The Indian Institute of Human Settlements, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Hyderabad University and The India International Centre among others.