Susan Oxtoby, director of film and senior film curator at the University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA), is developing a significant curatorial research project that will examine the tradition of Indian art cinema from the mid-1950s to the present. The scope of the project will begin with the landmark film Pather Panchali (1955), the first work of Satyajit Ray’s iconic Apu Trilogy, and extend to include works by filmmakers associated with the Film Society movement and the Parallel Cinema movements, which exemplified an artistic break from India’s mainstream Bollywood film industry in pursuit of non-commercial art cinema practice. The project will also include the study of contemporary Indian cinema and the involvement and recognition of women filmmakers in a field that has long been male dominated. Oxtoby’s curatorial research will result in several BAMPFA film series organized as directorial retrospectives and thematic explorations.
Susan Oxtoby
“The Warhol Foundation aims to support the full range of artistic activity in America—from exhibitions at major museums to neighborhood projects by artist collectives. Arts writers, through the range and specialization of their individual interests, touch upon all of this activity—illuminating and interrogating it and bringing it into conversation with the public. Support for artists is not complete without support for the circulation and serious consideration of their ideas. The Arts Writers Grant program keeps artists at the center of cultural dialogue and debate—in our opinion, right where they belong.”
Joel Wachs, President