Event Time
Saturday, November 3, 2007
11:00 AM
Location
Center for Architecture
(536 LaGuardia Place between Bleecker and W. 3rd Streets)
Contact
Name: Center for Religion and Media
Email: center.religion.media@nyu.edu
Phone: 212.998.7608
Screening and discussion
NYU's Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, the Department of Media, Culture and Communication, the Center for Religion and Media, and the Council for Media and Culture are pleased to present a screening and discussion with filmmaker Paromita Vohra
Q2P
(Paromita Vohra, 2007, 53 min.)
Set in Mumbai, the film observes who has access to toilets and who doesn't, and how gender, power, and the need to "go" make up public space and bodily well-being.
As part of a day-long conference on Sex, Gender and the Public Toilet: Outing the Water Closet Bringing together pioneering scholars of sex and gender with leading design professionals and activists to consider, critique, and reconstruct the public rest room.
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Paromita Vohra is a filmmaker and writer, whose work has been widely screened at festivals and museums worldwide. Her films as director are Q2P, a film about public toilets and the vision of the global city, which was awarded the Best Documentary Award at the IFFLA and Stuttgart festivals, besides being exhibited at the Tate Modern, Morality TV and the Loving Jehad: A Thrilling Tale) a documentary on moral policing and tabloid culture set in Meerut; Where's Sandra?, a film about sexual and community stereotyping of Christian women; Work In Progress (2004) about the World Social Forum which took place in Bombay in 2004); Cosmopolis: Two Tales of A City (2004), a film that probes the myth of Bombay's cosmopolitanism through the politics of land and food,(Award for Best Film Indo-British Digital Film Festival); Unlimited Girls (2001), an exploration of what feminism means to different people in urban India (Women's News Award, Seoul Film Festival; Best Film, Aaina Film Festival, Best Documentary, Bollywood and Beyond, 2004); A Woman's Place (1998), a film about women's legal strategies in India, South Africa and the USA (for PBS); Annapurna: Goddess of Food (1995) about an organization of women food workers in Bombay's textile mill area which has been broadcast in 10 countries and A Short Film About Time (1999) a short fiction about a woman with a broken heart, her therapist and his watch.
Her films as a writer includes the feature films Silent Waters, about a woman whose life is transformed by growing fundamentalism in a Pakistani village (dir: Sabiha Sumar), (Best Screenplay Award, Kara Film Festival, Best Film, Locarno Film Festival) and Khamoshi:The Musical (Additional Scriptwriting) (dir: Sanjay Leela Bhansali); the documentaries Skin Deep, A Few Things I Know About Her (Silver Conch,MIFF 2002, National Award for Best Documentary, 2002) and If You Pause: In a Museum of Craft. She writes extensively for print, both fiction and non-fiction, including a fortnightly column for the Mumbai Mirror. She teaches scriptwriting as visiting faculty at various universities and has done considerable work with young people with a focus on radio.
FOR ENQUIRIES CONTACT- Paromita Vohra: parodevi@gmail.com, 011-91-9189377960