In the bustling industrial zone of Okhla, far from New Delhi's conventional art circuits, a unique exhibition is making waves by delving into the very soul of India's cinematic obsession. Titled 'Duniya Parchhaiyon Ki' (World of Shadows), the show at the Arthshila arts centre is a profound exploration of cinephilia—the deep, often personal love for cinema—and how its memories persist long after the projector stops.
A Multi-Sensory Journey Through Cinematic Love
Curated by eminent film historian Ashish Rajadhyaksha for the Takshila Education Society, the exhibition sprawls across three floors and approximately 6,000 square feet. It is designed as a multi-layered spectacle, immersing visitors in a world of posters, murals, sound installations, multi-channel videos, and even AI-generated animations. Six artists were specially commissioned to create new works for this event, blending traditional artefacts with cutting-edge technology.
Ravikant, an intermedia historian from CSDS, points out the challenge of defining cinephilia. "Understanding cinephilia is not easy," he says, "because there is no clear way to measure it." Often, the only remnants are paper trails—old magazines, letters, song booklets—and sonic traces from audio recordings. Films themselves may vanish, but these fragments endure, carrying the memory of cinema forward in new, unexpected forms.
Posters, AI and the Recycled Life of Cinema
A central pillar of the exhibition is the humble film poster. Displayed pieces like ‘Del De Ke Dekho', ‘April Fool', and ‘Sultana Daku' are more than nostalgic relics. Rajadhyaksha describes them as "yesterday's memes," each with its own subterranean history and economic journey. In the 1960s and 70s, original posters were often crafted by celebrated artists like Diwakar Karkare. Later, they were adapted to local tastes in smaller towns during re-runs.
"Posters, and even song booklets, helped people own and domesticate cinema," explains Rajadhyaksha. "They allowed you to intervene in cinema and talk back to the art. Do things literally with your hands." The exhibition showcases this evolution, with a striking display where classic posters of stars like Dilip Kumar, Rekha, and Nargis melt into new, fluid forms through Artificial Intelligence (AI), symbolizing their multiple lives and afterlives.
The local context of Okhla, known for its recycling economy, is ingeniously woven into the narrative. The show features handloom weaves made from recycled film posters, drawing a direct link between material reuse and cultural preservation. Rajadhyaksha sees a profound connection: "The idea of keeping cinematic memory alive is similar to what the person stripping film reels and turning them into handlooms is doing. Everyone talks about the death of cinema, but cinema doesn't die. It goes underground."
Fragments of a Fading Archive and Lasting Legacy
The exhibition powerfully highlights the fragile state of India's film heritage. Rajadhyaksha reveals a startling fact: less than five per cent of India's cinema is preserved in the vaults of the National Film Archive of India. The rest is often lost or exists in precarious forms—on decaying VHS tapes, VCDs, or 16mm prints in the hands of kabadiwalas (scrap dealers), where reels are stripped for silver or repurposed into bangles.
Other displays evoke powerful nostalgia. A hall features 30 television sets, specially manufactured in Old Delhi for the show, playing a looped clip from Amitabh Bachchan's ‘Deewar' that morphs into other forgotten scenes. Giant cloth murals, some measuring 12x24 feet, adorn the walls. One hall merges art with text, displaying verses by Urdu poet Jaun Elia in elegant calligraphy, reflecting the exhibition's deliberate inclusion of Urdu, partly due to the nearby presence of Jamia.
The show also pays homage to the grassroots of cinephilia, recalling the hundreds of 'shrota sanghs' (listeners' clubs) that sprang up across small-town India in the 1970s and 80s. These clubs, and the magazines they sometimes produced, were tangible proof of a nation's love affair with film radio programs. Ravikant muses that publishing such magazines in towns like Aligarh or Jabalpur was perhaps a way to give permanence to fleeting joys, like hearing one's name read out on the radio.
Nearly 130 years after motion pictures first arrived in India, the Arthshila exhibition, next scheduled for Patna, stands as a testament to an unending love story. It convincingly argues that while films may degrade and disappear, the memory of cinema—fueled by passion, fragments, and even illegal bootleg economies—refuses to fade, continuing to thrive both on and off the screen.
