Films are simultaneously the language
of compassion and revolution.
THE INITIATIVE
Rough Edges facilitates multidisciplinary feminist cultural research, knowledge production, narrative building, archiving and education through creative documentary films and storytelling by women, trans and queer artists, especially those unheard and marginalised, as an essential and fundamental agent and catalyst of intersectional gender justice, solidarity and affirmative social change.
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We imagine Rough Edges as a space for artistic endeavour, rumination and dialogue, strengthening efforts contesting dominant codes of gendered cultural production and reception, dismantling the status quo, enriching countercultures and promoting affirmative change. This impulse is compelling, especially at a time when support for the independent documentary is abysmal and fast diminishing, worsened by the demolition of the freedom of expression and contrarian opinion.
Films play a special role in a broken society,
laying bare hurtful truths, asking questions of those in power, offering solace and galvanising people.
THE INTENTION
Commission filmmakers, across diversities and locations, amplifying new and unheard voices, marginalised on the basis of their gender identity, sexual orientation, caste, class, disability, religion, ethnicity, work or region, typically in conjunction with each other.
Offer robust and committed creative collaboration and support through the making of the films, enabling artists to experiment, innovate and create their best works, enlarging the scope of our visual cultures and references and pushing the boundaries of documentary form and practice.
Produce a substantial body of work around critical themes and experiences around gendered lives and living, addressing significant feminist, artistic and public discourse priorities, with a view to bringing them to greater public attention. The films we commission complement each other in offering a range of artistic interpretations of and responses to lived realities, emboldening us to think, share, act, challenge.
Showcase and disseminate films in various contexts, with and without other kinds of artistic media, to empower filmmakers, support creative community networks and peoples’ movements, facilitate pedagogical and public culture interventions, encourage deliberation and collaboration around documentary films, their making, viewing and imprints.
Explore alliances for co-creation and co-exhibition with individuals and groups invested in questions around socio-political representation and participation.
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Build audiences for the documentary in a hyperdigital, interconnected and intensely visual world.
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The making of films is about collective history,
identity and memory-making. When the hands that
mould it change, form itself is revolutionised.
THE TEAM
Rough Edges is the initiative of Ridhima Mehra and Tulika Srivastava, who have been working in the world of documentary films and social change for over two decades. We draw on our extensive experiences at the Public Service Broadcasting Trust, leading the commissioning, creative realisation and outreach of 700 films, diverse in artistic form, subject and authorship. The films travelled around the world - 2000 festival selections, 350 awards, including thirty national film awards, screenings and honours at the Oscars, Berlinale, Rotterdam, Oberhausen, Yamagata, Busan and Sheffield, among others, and continue to be used extensively across local and domestic contexts for advocacy. We curated films, conversations, exhibitions and trainings in documentary for fourteen editions of the annual international festival, the Open Frame, to enhance reflections on multiple lived realities.
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Our work and processes are informed by the collective energies and vision that inspire, activate and sustain independent creative cinematic production, dissemination and advocacy. We are being aided and supported by an Advisory Team of diverse, experienced feminist activists, artists and practitioners, in framing and steering the creative, philosophical, political and institutional intentions and mandates of Rough Edges. They enrich our perspectives and strengthen our efforts.
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Amritananda Chakravorty, queer feminist lawyer; human rights litigator; policy advocate.
Bina Paul, National Award winning Film Editor; former Artistic Director, International Film Festival of Kerala. Joint President, Network for the Promotion of Asian and Pacific Cinema; Co-Founder, Women in Cinema Collective.
Lalsawmliani Tochhawng, arts administrator and curator with special interest in cinema. Former Chief, Programmes,
India international Centre.
Suneeta Dhar, policy advocate and facilitator, institutional processes to advance gender equality and rights.
Tulika Srivastava, feminist lawyer; international advisor, centring rights-based approaches in ensuring gender and resource justice.
Vijeta Kumar, writer, critic and teacher.
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Together, we strive to build Rough Edges with the conviction and audacity that feminism and documentary encounters
transform everything!