About The Event
This project has been conceptualised using elements of digital storytelling in unfolding the narrative of a heavily polluted river, ka Wah Umkhrah and its dying tributaries flowing through the city of Shillong in Meghalaya. Coming from a tradition and culture of orality we look at how stories can and in this case of an ecologically threatened water body, be told today, to nudge us inhabitants of the city to pay heed to the abuse and degradation it has been subjected to. As we structured the piece we created a website where all these memories have been filmed and recorded, using storytelling, shadow puppetry, documentary film, poetry in performance, the body in performance and ki phawar recited and sung about the river Umkhrah- its present and past state. We have compiled a series of chapters taking the audience on a journey of the past, the blurred lines of memory, the present and the liminal spaces of lost narratives. How can we perform and preserve these disintegrating memories in the digital space where memory space can always be bought and expanded?
