Puppetoscope (Out Of The Shadows): International Puppet Film Festival

Puppetoscope (Out of the Shadows): International Puppet Film Festival at India International Centre, Lodhi Estate

Note: Call 011-24619431 (IIC) to re-confirm any last-minute change or cancellation of the event.    

Venue: Main Building, India International Centre (IIC), 40 Max Mueller Marg, Lodhi Estate, New Delhi-110003, India
Film Screenings: C.D. Deshmukh Auditorium | Talks: Conference Room II
Venue Info: Events | About | Map | Nearest Metro Stations - 'Khan Market(Violet Line)' & 'Jor Bagh(Yellow Line)'
Area: Lodhi Road Area Events

Event Description: Puppetoscope (Out Of The Shadows): International Puppet Film Festival

Dedicated to Smt. Kamaladevi Chattopadhyaya

Organised in collaboration with Kathkatha Puppet Arts Trust and with the support of the Goethe Institut/Max Mueller Bhavan, the festival includes a seminar; shadow puppet festival; and screening of films

Schedule: 

3 April 2025: 
From 10:00 to 17:00 in Conference Room II
Out of Shadows: Discussions on the Plurality of Shadow Puppets
Keynote Address by Anurupa Roy, Indian puppeteer, puppet designer and director of puppet theatre

Presentations by Prof. Peter W. Marx, German theatre and performance studies scholar, Chairperson of Theatre and Media Studies, University of Cologne; Prof. Kaushik Bhaumik, Associate Professor in Cinema Studies, School of Arts and Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University; Airan Berg, international working theatre maker and artistic director, who specialises in large scale participatory and inclusive objects; he is the Artistic Director of Festival deer Regionen; Gunduraju, who belongs to a family of Togalu Gombeyaata, shadow puppeteers from Karnataka; Prof. Gouranga Charan Dash, Srirama Institute of Shadow Theatre; Ranjana Pandey, Editor and Publisher of Sutradhar and President, UNIMA India; and Dr. Atul Sinha, Assistant Professor  

AT 18:30 IN THE C.D. DESHMUKH AUDITORIUM
Film Before Film (Was geschah wirklich zwischen den Bildern/ Germany)
(83 min; 1986; German with English subtitles)
Director: Werner Nekes

An exhilarating and amusing encyclopedic look at the “prehistory” of cinema. Nekes charts the fascination with moving pictures which led to the birth of film, covering shadow plays, peep shows, flip books, flicks, magic lanterns, lithopanes, scrolls and numerous historical artifices

4 April 2025:
10am
PUPPETOSCOPE (OUT OF THE SHADOWS): INTERNATIONAL PUPPET FILM FESTIVAL Films
Programme Type Festivals
Venue C.D. Deshmukh Auditorium, IIC main building
Desa Timun: Collection Vol. I (The Cucumber Village/Indonesia)
(32 min; 2021; b/w; with English subtitles)
Director: Daud Nugraha

Shadow puppet animation which tells the story of three little mousedeers: Cila, Cili, and Cilo, who always want to play. The Cucumber Village series combined actual Indonesian traditional shadow puppet (wayang kulit) and digital animation. It has been screened in multiple international children film festivals and won awards in 12 countries, such as in San Diego International Children Film Festival, Kineko International Children Film Festival Japan.

AT 15:00
Nee Engey (Where are You/India)
(150 min; 2003; with English subtitles)
Director: R.V. Ramani

An impressionist ethnography of the puppet theatre tradition in some of the southern states of India. The filmmaker tracks both the performances and the lives of the puppeteers— painting a haunting picture of the neglect of a tradition and the difficult lives of the puppeteers.

AT 18:30: PERFORMANCE
Episode from Ramayana (Tamil)
From the Tamil Nadu shadow puppetry tradition
Presented by Kalaimamani Muthulakshmana Rao and team from Theni, Tamil Nadu

5 April 2025: 
10am: The Lost Glove (UK)
(6 min; 2016; non-verbal)
Director: Lizzie Oxby

It’s that time of the year when gloves get lost, and found…

Planet Utopia – A Possibility (Brazil)
(25 min; 2013; non-verbal)
Directors: Silvana Marcondes, Amanda Viera, Evelyn Cristina, Kika Antunes, Natalia Peixoto, William Simplico

A show without words, with visual and sound dramaturgy, entirely designed for the virtual universe

The Migrants (Retirantes/Brazil)
(13 min; non-verbal)
Director: Maira Coelho

The short film tells the story of a woman traveling through an arid, depopulated region, unable to feed her baby. The film combines “live-motion” and “stop-motion” techniques, visual arts, puppetry and cinema.

The Package (Canada)
(14 min; French with English subtitles)
Director: Lucie Ernard

Intrigued by the delivery of numerous packages at her new neighbour’s house, Jeannette at 80 is getting out of her loneliness to live a last love story

FROM 14:00 TO 17:00
Scribouillis (Canada)
(11 min;  French with English subtitles)
Directors: Noemi Belanger, Maia Menard-Belanger

Scribouillis is a tribute to the imagination of children and a metaphor for our fear of the unknown

Life Cycles (Brazil)
(6 min; Portuguese with English subtitles)
Directors: Thiago Bresani, Maria Soledad Garcia

The story tells the relationship between a granddaughter and a grandmother and the moments of uncertainty in view of the impossibility of meeting

A Treasure (USA)
(6 min; English)
Director: Freddie Levin

With the help of a very large dragon, a poor tailor searches for a treasure and finds it where he least expects it

Valentin, the Puppeteer Puppet (Brazil)
(4 min; non-verbal)
Director: Naiara Parolin

To escape monotony and loneliness, Valentin uses creativity to create a new company

After the Endling (UK)
(15 min; English)
Director: Daniel A. Kelin

This is a story of a pupu kani oe (Hawaiian tree snail) named George and a tiny, yet vital, battle against extinction

The Adventures of Prince Achmed ( Die Abenteuer des Prinzen Achmed/Germany)
(80 min; 1926; German with English subtitles) 
Directors: Lotte Reiniger, Carl Koch

A handsome prince rides a flying horse to faraway lands and embarks on magical adventures, which including befriending a witch, meeting Aladdin, battling demons and falling love with a princess

AT SIDDHARTHA HALL, GOETHE INSTITUT FROM 21:00 TO 06:00: PERFORMANCE
Sita Apaharan: Ram-Raavan Yuddha (Kannada, Hindi)
From Karnataka Shadow puppetry tradition
Presented by Shri Raja Rama Togalu Gombe Mela from Hassan, Karnataka

6 April 2025:
Body Transference (Chile)
(45 min; Spanish with English subtitles)
Director: Catalina Bize del Campo

Film that talks about old age as a liminal experience between life and death

Our Tales (Mexico)
(4 min; Spanish with English subtitles)
Director L Flavia Hevia

A short film designed to capture the vital memories held by immigrant women from their homelands and recreate them in Stop Motion Animation

Chiaroscuro (Canada)
(9 min; non-verbal)
Director: Elias Djemil-Matassov

Chiaroscuro…between the light and the dark that life operates in contrasts. Between the puppeteer and the puppet. Between shadow and light

The Room of Forgotten Voices (Ireland)
(19 min; English)
Directors: Emma Fisher-Owen, Ivan Fisher-Owen

A day in the life of Hugh’s brain on a very normal day, but inside his head he encounters hundreds of versions of himself…

Persephone (Canada)
15 min; non-verbal)
Director: Emilie Racine

Created as a palimpsest blending mythical references and personal mythology, the film traces the trajectory of an identity quest through a feminine lens, addressing mother-daughter transmission

AT 16:00
Iniskim-Return of the Buffalo (Canada)
(39 min; 2024; English)
Directors: Leanne Allison, Pete Balkwill, Amethyst First Rider

An intercultural artistic response to the return of the buffalo, as wild animals, to North America. The film is an opportunity to learn about Indigenous ways of knowing as a group of puppeteers are transformed by their experience of ‘being buffalo’ at night under the stars, guided by the stories of the Blackfoot Elders.

AT 18:30: PERFORMANCE
Shadow Puppet Theatre
Presented by UNIMA Puppeteers Trust-India

Related Links: Film | Talk
Puppetoscope (Out Of The Shadows): International Puppet Film Festival Puppetoscope (Out Of The Shadows): International Puppet Film Festival Reviewed by DelhiEvents on Monday, May 06, 2024 Rating: 5

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