AKSHAT DRAMA GROUP - ART PORTFOLIO

AKSHAT DRAMA GROUP

EVERYTHING IS UNTOUCHABLE  

(Exhibition - Designer, Host)

A live exhibition created to express the hypocrite thought process prevalent in society & instead of presenting history, we chose to showcase live incidences including the Delhi gang Rape, my brother’s accident wherein no one standing there was ready to touch his mutilated leg & yet could talk about him hopefully reaching the hospital, a cartoon comic video with an educated professor pushing away a poor man because he accidentally touched his hand & washing it in front of him. The tour of the exhibition ends with a choice, to accept the truth & hang the live statue to death or accept him, a man dripping with blood & gore.

PANKHI

मुझे उड़ने तो दो 

(Theatre School and Workshop)

A theatre group formed by Akshat Drama Group for the street kids of Mirzapur, to give them a platform to develop and channelize their energies and focus from activities such as gambling to teamwork and performing arts.

It was a 3 month workshop including street plays, expert guidance, a documentary filming the experience felt by the kids & a grand finale performance.

CHOTU CHAIWALA

(Fiction Short Film - Writer, Director)

Inside a tea stall, one morning, Chotu dreams of education.

It is a story which ventures deep into education & human perspective. The country promises each & every citizen to provide education as the most basic right, a fundamental right. A right which a child has since birth, which he can claim, but the question is, from whom?

Screened on 14^th November, 2015 at 10 cafe’s and Alpha One(now Ahmedabad One) mall in Ahmedabad.
Received place in top 10 short films to watch list by National Human Rights Commission in 2015.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gkVtKFucX4c

YOU DISCRIMINATE

Education starts at home, so does discrimination.

(Proscenium Theatre - Writer, Director)

A blend of forum theatre and street play, the 15 minute play turned into an hour long debate and saw fascinating participation from the audience at Seva Café & Conflictorium museum in Ahmedabad. 

The play focused on discrimination inside the home for improving the roots is better than colouring the leaves.

Forum theatre gets the audience to re enact their reactions to the set situations in the play. It questions the audience & enables them to voice their thoughts.

KATHPUTLI KA KHEL

(Rural Culture - Event Organiser)

Puupet show performance by the Amdavadi rural folk of Akshat Drama Group was staged twice at Conflictorium auditorium and streets of Mirzapur. The performance gives a peek into the rich culture of India with kathputli dances and folk lore. Rarely known but equally entralling history is explored along with the traditional story of how puppet show evolved in India from Singhasan Battisi.

MARITAL RAPE 

(Comic - Content & Design)

I AM ON SALE

Before my marriage, my father is my guardian. After my marriage, my husband is my guardian.

WHO AM I?

After an online & offline research conducted on 605 subjects, we published our research along with a comic series & the researcher’s experience as part of our #MaritalRape campaign on our website, blog & social media handles.

JUST THINK IT ONCE

(Play - Writer & Director)

On 31st May 2016, WORLD NO TOBACCO DAY
This play performance was created & enacted by Akshat Drama Group for GCS Medical College, Hospital & Research Center, Ahmedabad.

The play was performed at 4 locations on the day:

GCS Hospital Auditorium 

Kalupur railway station

Divya Bhaskar House

Ahmedabad Management Association

Similar play were written & directed for associated occasions such as WORLD CANCER DAY.

YOUNG BHASKAR

(Marketing Campaign - Design & Execution)

The event was centred around Schools keeping in mind the young, learning audience of the magazine. Similar campaigns were conducted for other products and offers by Divya Bhaskar using various engaging and informative art forms.

A LITTLE LESS NORMAL

(Documentary - Researcher & Director)

In 2017, the government of India brought the Mental Health Care Act 2017 replacing the 1987 version. Many new rights were gifted, but how many gifts were opened? We explored Ahmedabad to match a paper with the map.

There should be an absolute right in all societies to be mad.  I interpret this to mean not only that if one succumbs to mental illness, society should provide appropriate and sufficient care and welfare -  whether it be in institutions or in the community - but also that society should be more accepting of people who are mad, those who are just, a little less normal

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5V5P12y-ZvI

KHURDARI KITAB

The last page poetry

(Poetry Book)

Every time I think of poetry, I hear the magic tune of Hogwarts in my head. Poetry is magic. Back then, a school princess with two pigtails used to wait for a white stallion in a class full of chalk & dusters. That girl lives in my book.

https://www.amazon.in/dp/B07P8TPCJ7

जिजीविषा

काव्य से जीवन की दिशा 

A poet’s poetry club at Akshat Drama Group’s studio in Ahmedabad. 

STAY POSITIVE

(Producer - Garnering 10 Lakh views)

Racism, homelessness, sudden evictions, circulation of phone no’s of infected person’s family members were some of the major issues that we wanted to not let go without including more people in active roles, in awareness, in kindness,

And what better way than art to support a social cause.

Thus started Stay Positive Movement, went on for 2 months and garnered over 10 lakh views, with amazing artists from The Caribbean Islands, Puerto Rico, Buenos Aires, London, Long Island (NY), San Francisco, Singapore, Dhaka

& India - Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Dehradun, Udaipur, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Gandhinagar, Bhilwara, Chandigarh

Talented and socially responsible artists have joined hands to give a message to India -

#STAYPOSITIVEINDIA

Meanwhile, offline, we focused on finding and securing legal shelter for beggars, homeless people, and daily wagers during the coronavirus lockdown, eventually getting the order passed for the same soon after the online campaign started.

PHASE I - RIGHT TO FOOD AND SHELTER FOR THE HOMELESS 

PHASE II - RIGHT TO PRIVACY

PHASE III - वसुधैव कुटुम्बकम्

https://www.facebook.com/watch/722396804620729/243320520156765/

https://www.facebook.com/flatandflatmateindia/videos/?ref=page_internal

‘THE DICTATOR’

WE LOVE TO RIDICULE POLITICALLY INCORRECT MOVIES

‘THE DICTATOR’

Laughing at a dictator’s whimsical ways should not come without guilt. At least, that’s what most of the reviews assume in their statement, ‘we laugh, we feel guilty & then we laugh harder’.

Is it necessary to feel a twinge of guilt because we are laughing at a cruel man? This movie is explicit, bold & sassy in its unshaven armpits & self-driven hand jobs. We do not laugh at Hitler & yet Charlie Chaplin bears a striking resemblance we conveniently chose to ignore. We do not laugh at Hitler, period.

Because that is what we do in real life. We do not laugh, we do sarcasm. It allows us a midway to ignore their atrocious actions & its direct victims. This film forces us to look in our own armpits. And see how badly we smell. Not stink, but smell. Stink is a polite word. And this movie does not do polite.

It serves China on a plate, cuts the US in front of the UN & gives a new dress to the dictator of Wadiya, democracy. It brings to light a rich man’s pedophile habits & our own hypocrisy of treating prim celebrities like virgins because hey, they are not standing in a dark alleyway luring clients like a prostitute. We love them so much we ignore all the scandals & adore their sex-tapes in polite Instagram comments. This movie throws it on our face like vomit & yet we are not able to stop chuckling. That is, in summary, The Dictator.

ACCENT IS THE HEROINE

When Admiral General Haffaz Aladeen rolls his tongue around the word Wadiya, possessive, lightly flicks the word constitution, unworthy, makes love to the word pointy & unwillingly touches the farcical democracy. You cannot help but orgasm.

WHAT IT NEEDS

Promotion.

WHAT THE PEOPLE THINK IT NEEDS

A coming of age of the dictator, by him changing his ways. But will it be real? If it did, it would be nothing but another glaring example of human hypocrisy. To want a social contract like Thomas Hobbes is obvious as its being one of the most dominant theories within moral and political theory throughout the history of the modern West. But this movie is made by Larry Charles, a feminist or a more aware person. He accepts that this way of life is an incomplete picture of our moral and political lives, and may in fact camouflage some of the ways in which the contract is itself parasitical upon the subjugations of classes of

THE MUMMY – A LOVE STORY IN CAIROS

THE MUMMY – A LOVE STORY IN CAIROS

“& then there was light”

And the underground chamber fills with bright sunlight bouncing on rustic mirrors. If this scene had been made in our 3d times, you would be standing in a chamber of secrets hidden underneath the beautiful sand. Dreamers still feel the rush in this 2d Egypt. This rush proves its worth.

“Americans!”

Beautiful because the director, Stephen Sommers hides the blood. A muscled half-naked mummy who says thank you to the girl with human emotion, a cowboy who never looks tan despite baking in the desert sun & a highly educated librarian team up to offer a serving of mills & boons. The viewers are able to ignore the fact that the villain is trying to kill the girl when he tries to kiss her in a mode of worship. This is not a creation, it is a recreation. A desert & camels version of the original, ‘The Mummy’.

This feature fiction does not feel old. Not least because the mummy is not wrapped in bandages but also because the visual effects of 2018 don’t outdate the magic done by Alex Laurant.

They carefully avoid anything fluid because humans have a tendency to connect fluids with gore. Alex kept the balance by not tipping off the movie to a horror genre. Its characters funny, the hero not outright courageous but somewhere in between, kept the audience from pointing out obvious historical mistakes. The movie progresses with the physical development of Imhotep, a skeleton to a skeleton with muscle & sinew, let there be a human body bit by bit.

You can see through the mummy, vital parts are missing. This is where it deviates from the norm, from other movies like Dracula or The Invisible Man. The grossness threshold is limited to a minimum by keeping the mummy dry & dusty.

(Dracula 1992)

They were riding on a dangling threshold to accurately match the final Imhotep with the skeleton but the risk eventually paid off.

WHY IMHOTEP STANDS OUT IN MEMORY?

Once you trust your director, you can fly. In Indian cinema, directors like Raj Kapoor could get a timeless movie out of first-time actors because they got physical directions to the T (Ram Teri Ganga Maili). Stephen gave Arnold Vosloo acute description, got him to behave like a physical mummy then his actions were matched with the animated mummy. Credit due to a beautiful marriage between makeup & computer effects. Watching him grow in a 2d theatre, you are scared but you are not, horrified. Because there is a cowboy-librarian love story to tend to. 

The Mummy also had a love story. 

Unlike other villains running after power in the afterlife.

Who are the minions of the mummy? The bugs. I hate the bugs. A major pie of the descendants of the homo-sapiens live in fear of the creepy crawly, evidence: sale of HIT (famous insect killing spray brand in India)

Nothing works for a skeptic, same goes for this film. But movie-making is all about imagination. And imagination is the single mother who time & again gives birth to new discoveries. But she is a single mother. She is ignored.

* * *

A little less normal - Mental Health Care Act 2017

A new wave of change is hitting the country. We all are affected by the lives surrounding us. All of us know at least 1 name in our knowledge who suffers from a mental illness. As students of Law & Human Rights, we set out to study Mental Health Care Act 2017 & its repercussions straight from the experts. Special Feature: Parivartan Cafe, a place run by cured mentally ill patients. (Ahmedabad) Directed By: Priya Sogani

जन्मदिन का तोहफा

वो सुबह से कचरे के ढेर खोद रहा था, टूटी हुई खिड़कियों से घरो में घुसपैठ कर रहा था पर उसे निन्ना के लिए कोई तोहफा ना समझ आया I

बड़ी सी तोफहे की दुकान भी होती तो भी उसे ना समझ आता कि क्या तोहफा लिया जाये I 'ये परेशानी से तो दुनिया का हर शौहर रूबरू है', खुद से बतियाता रहा और पीछे देखते-देखते आगे बढ़ता रहा I

सुबह के 5 बजे थे और कल रात वो निन्ना को जन्मदिन कि मुबारकबाद देना भूल गया था I 4 बजे भूक से उसकी नींद टूटी तब रोटी ढूँढ़ते-ढूँढ़ते उसके दिमाग की बत्ती जली I रोटी की तलाश छोड़, वो अँधेरे के लिए अल्लाह को शुक्रिया अदा करते हुए घर से निकल पड़ा I

पिछली बार कितने धूमधाम से उसका जन्मदिन मनाया था I बेकरी से बढ़िया बड़ा वाला केक भी आया था I पिछले महीने ही मनवाल ने उसे गली के तार पे तार डाल कर कनेक्शन लेना सिखाया था, 'कितना भला आदमी है' I हालाँकि निन्ना कुछ ज्यादा ही तारीफ करती है उसकी I

वो जानबूझ कर निन्ना से लड़ाई करता, फिर उसे मनाता I इस खेल में उसे बड़ा मज़ा आता था I अब तो खेलने को एक नया सदस्य भी आ रहा था I जब भी निन्ना का नाम उसके दिमाग में आता, वो आस-पास कि सुध भूल के उसके खयालो में चलता I आज भी यही हुआ I पिछले कुछ दिन वो सतर्क रहा I टी. वी. की खबरे घर के बाहर ही घटने लगी थी I हवा में प्लेन उड़ने लगे थे, जिनकी आवाज़ निन्ना को ज़रा भी पसंद ना थी I

निन्ना को कौवे पसंद ना थे I वो घर की दीवाल पे बैठ पाते इस से पहले उस्मान पत्थर तैयार कर देता I पर प्लेन कौवे ना थे I इस बेबसी ने उसे सतर्क रहना सिखा दिया था I

उधर निन्ना की नींद खुल चुकी थी I उसने आँखें खोली ही थी और पटाखे सी आवाज़ से उसके कान बंद हो गए I धमाका सुन उस्मान का प्यारा दोस्त और गली का आवारा, इत्र, वहा आया पर भौकने के अलावा वो कुछ कर ना सका I वो निन्ना को देखता रहा और पूछता रहा, ‘उस्मान कहा है?’

पर निन्ना क्या बताती I उसके पैर में काँच के टुकड़े धसे हुए थे पर उस्मान को ना पाकर उसकी आँखें खुश थी I ‘मेरे लिए आँसू मत बहाओ इत्र I उस्मान से कहना, मुझे मेरा तोहफा मिल गया I’