Bodies Of Desire

Using Varsha's anthology by the same name, Bodies of Desire is a film that captures four sets of lovers amid passion; to create a portrait of tender intimacy, of longing, of discovery, of desire, of embrace and care, of profound companionship. The film was one of the Five Films For Freedom 2021.

The film is being developed into a narrative feature.

Writer, Director, Voice, Co-Producer - Varsha Panikar | Length: 3.47 min | Language: English

Premiere: Nowness Asia | September 2020

Platforms: Nowness Asia, Nowness, Director's Library, Otherness Archive, GiF, BFI Player

Awards:

Rio Festival De Cinema LGBTQIA+ 2022 - Best Int'l Short, Special Festival Award Festival Jury

24fps International Short Film Festival - Honourable Mention

Best Music Video - Global Indian Film Festival 2021

Official Film Website (Short)

Words Of Pride - Launch Film

Here’s a sneak peek into the 11 socio-linguistic micro documentaries made with Disney + Star. #WordsOfPride is an advocacy initiative by Disney Star, created with language experts from the queer community. It is a glossary of terms to create a more inclusive world.

The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too. Visit www.wordsofpride.com to know more.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 59 sec | Language: Multi-lingual (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

Words Of Pride - Nandini's Story

Nandini takes us through her journey towards reclaiming the word 'Hijra' - that was used to abuse and oppress her. A story that emphasises the need for language that is rooted in respect and inclusivity - the very essence of #WordsOfPride. An advocacy initiative by Disney Star. It is a glossary of terms created with language experts from the queer community for a more inclusive society.

The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too. Visit www.wordsofpride.com to know more.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 2.16 mins | Language: Telugu (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Format: Socio-linguistic micro documentaries

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

Words Of Pride - Kabir's Story

Kabir tells us about his journey of navigating society and language to grow into the person he is today. Checkout Kabir’s full story on https://wordsofpride.disneystar.com/e... The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 2.39 mins | Language: Hindi (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Format: Socio-linguistic micro documentaries

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

Words Of Pride - Priyadarshini's Story

Watch Priyadarshini tell us about their relationship with language on their journey towards self, beyond the social conditioning surrounding gender and sexuality. Checkout Priyadarshani’s story on https://wordsofpride.disneystar.com/e... The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 2.44 mins | Language: Bengali (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Format: Socio-linguistic micro documentaries

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

Words Of Pride - Maya's Story

Maya busts myths around Intersex identities and sheds light on the lack of awareness surrounding Intersex lives even amongst the educated. Checkout Maya’s story on https://wordsofpride.disneystar.com/e... The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 2.24 mins | Language: Tamil (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Format: Socio-linguistic micro documentaries

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

Words Of Pride - Adam's Story

As India’s first trans pilot, refusing to give up on his dreams, Adam believes, one day, he will be able to fly as himself. Checkout Adam’s story on https://wordsofpride.disneystar.com/e... The world is evolving; it’s time our words do too.

Director & Executive Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 2.48 mins | Language: Malayalam (English, Hindi, Telugu, Kanada, Malayalam, Bengali, Tamil subtitles)

Format: Socio-linguistic micro documentaries

Premiere: 6th Sept 2023

Country: India

Platforms: Disney + Star Network

After So Long // बरसों बाद

A visual poetry set in Mumbai (India) and voiced by Simha and their parents to symbolise their connection with each other; a walkabout through time and memories from the point of view of the artist. As a queer BIPOC artist born in India and raised in the US, Simha felt a certain indignant disconnect from their own ancestry. Written in part-Hindi and part-English, the film serves as an homage to these roots and delves into themes of identity, belonging and mental-health.

Director - Varsha Panikar | Producer - Star Hopper | Length: 3.37 min | Language: Hindi & English (English & Hindi subtitles

Premiere: Nowness Asia | '22

Country: USA, India, Canada

Platforms: Nowness Asia, GiF, Homegrown

Screenings:

No Border X Nowness | Flying Chameleon Film Festival '22 | Simha Records x Queer Mango

Feminist Youth Leadership Programme

Here’s a sneak peek into our film, made in collaboration with Gender At Work (India) and UN Women (India).

Producer - Varsha Panikar | Production House - Star Hopper | Length: 10.37 min | Language: Hindi & English (English subtitles)

Premiere: 1st June 2023

Country: USA, India, Canada

Platforms: UN Women (India) , Gender At Work (India) and

Premiere:Launch of knowledge products for the Feminist Youth Leadership Programme (FYLP) at We the People Hall, UN House, New Delhi.

False Promises

A spoken-word film, written and voiced by Varsha Panikar during the 2020 pandemic.

"I wrote this poem a year ago as an act of hope, a learning I would have liked to impart to my past-self, to perhaps, soften the blow of life’s turbulences and uncertainties. It's a reminder of human resilience, of our undying instinct for survival, of hope that has got us this far, that "we won’t just let it all fall apart" - Varsha.

A part of the narration that may resonate with its viewers and also manages to capture the essence of the film is — “I wonder, why no one told us that falling isn’t easy; like living, laughing and crying!” - Homegrown

Festivals:

Special Mention and Certificate of Excellence, 11th Dada Saheb Phalke Film Festival 2021 | New York City Independent Film Festival 2021

Sign Easy + GoogleDocs

Directed by Varsha Panikar | Client: Sign Easy | Agency: MAD

Gits - Spot

Directed by Varsha Panikar | Client: GITS | Agency : Togglehead Digital Pvt Ltd

The Three Renegades

The Remaking of A Memory - A workshop by Gob Squad Collective, as part of Starting Realities.

Curated by Kai Tuchmann and Anuja Ghosalkar

Supported by Goethe-Institut, Max Mueller Bhavan, Mumbai.

Concept & Edit - Varsha Panikar | Written and performed by Varsha Panikar, Gurleen Arora and Sophie Roy.

Doll Mortuary

Sitting in a corner of an old beat up shop, sit beautiful porcelain dolls willing to risk a drop. To be loved and taken off the shelves. These porcelain dolls are afraid to break, but willing to risk a crack that runs across their beautiful face. Weeks turn into months, months into years, the dolls now covered in dust and cobb webs are left with little to no hope as they continue to she sit in their corner of the shop.

Spoken Word film | Created for Bric-a-Brac, a finely curated workshop employing found footage and the politics of poor image. | UFO by Star Hopper

"As filmmaking paleontologists, we unearth forgotten fragments from the archives and use layered sound to transport audiences to the past. We trust our intuition, following serendipitous discoveries to piece together hidden narratives. unearthing skeletons and piecing them back together without full knowledge of what one is making. There is an element of serendipity, letting the images you are attracted to lead the way before working backwards to find a story.

As Courtney Stephen eloquently put it, there's a joy in discovering the potential of these forgotten fragments and piecing them back together into something meaningful." - Varsha.

Poetry, Voice, Edited by Varsha Panikar | Footage By AnamalousFilms | 'A Drowning Island' by Unheard Music Concepts.

The Timeless Charm of a Chance Encounter (Gurucharanji)

Asawari and I were doing research for a documentary in Shimla when we stumbled upon a tiny shop of vintage timepieces on the famous Mall Road. We met Gurucharan Singh, a friendly old Ghadiwala who fell in love with analogue clocks and opened his own shop. As we discussed time, we sensed a sadness in him, perhaps a reminder of what he had lost. We shot some footage of him and promised to return, but unfortunately missed our chance. Years later, we found the old footage and decided to put it together as a tribute to Gurucharanji and his love for clocks.

Returning to the themes of chance encounters, surreal connections, and serendipity, 'The Timeless Charm of a Chance Encounter' is a mixed-media series exploring the fleeting, but sometimes, memorable moments shared with total strangers.

Shot, Directed, Edited by Varsha Panikar & Asawari Jagushte

Kellogg's Upma 'Bachelor Pad'

Client - Kellogg's Agency - Ogilvy India

The Housemaids (Short)

The Housemaids is a film that delves into power struggles between class, gender and identity. Based loosely on the play The Maids by Gean Jenet, this film is about the inner lives of two sisters - housemaids to an ageing Madame in an upper-class ancestral home - as they spend their days playing transgressive power games.

Associate Producer & Styling - Varsha Panikar | | Director - Asawari Jagushte| Length: 23 min | Language: English (English subtitles)

Country: India

Platforms: Amazon Prime (UK/US) and Disney+ Hotstar (India)

Festival: Women Make Waves Film Festival (Taiwan) | Asian Women's Film Festival (IAWRT) | Bangalore Queer Film Festival (India)

Screenings:

Filamnt - Exploring Relationships

Flying Chameleon Film Festival

Watch on Amazon Prime (UK/US) or Disney + Hotstar (India)

Party La La La - Official Aftermovie

On February 27th, 2016 three Independent Bombay bands came together to put on a party like no other. Zero sponsorship, no crowd funding, instead fueled by belief, hard work and the desire to make something happen. Three Rock bands from Bombay, toured the city unplugged playing at offices, colleges and anywhere they could, promoting the DIY show of the year. So we decided to follow them around on 'The Day' and make something special for them. | Directed by Varsha Panikar

Elements

Series of shots showing water, oil, drop ink, milk, acrylics, sea reacting to motion, obstructions and gravity. Creating insight into the weird and wonderful world of macro scale. Next time, different background, liquid types, colours, lighting and aperture!

By Varsha Panikar

Origami Folds

An ongoing photo-poetry series that explores curves and folds of the human body (self and others) and uses it as a medium and metaphor for hopeless frailty and hardened impenetrability, from which emerges the themes of identity, dysphoria, the commodification of the body, and denial and loss of autonomy as conditions of globalized society and cultures through the lens of south-Asian, queer and marginalized bodies which are forever under critical scrutiny, objectification and dehumanizing policing from external and internal perspectives. Within this stifling framework, the skin has separated from the body, both physically in the act of medical dissection and alterations in an effort to meet popular standards of beauty, and metaphorically in the separation between skin and psyche. The skin here also represents time and wraps us up like cellophane wraps hard candy.

#antibeauty #teaser #origamifolds

36 Questions In Proximity Of A Conversation

A six-hour long immersive participatory experience about making space for listening, responding and play in a city that is known for it's race.

Conceptualized & Produced by: acceleratedintimacy | Facilitating Director: Nihaarika Negi | Videography and Photography : Varsha Panikar, Asawari Jagushte, Vincent

Welcome To The Army

A social commentary on pro war-rhetori by Varsha Panikar.

PocoM3 - Vox Pop

Brand - Xiaomi Poco | Agency - DDB Mudra, Bangalore

Butterfly Wings

Musings of a summer afternoon.

Poetry, Voice, Editing : Varsha Panikar | Music: Juillet by Monplaisi

Maya - Music Video

Concept, Direction: Varsha Panikar

Official music video of ‘Maya’ from Coshish’s debut album ‘Firdous’ © 2015 Universal Music India Pvt. Ltd. The video is shot following an enthno - experimental approach focusing on using a moving body in space against an unnerving background of sacred geometry. It is designed around the concept of the human spirit and body metamorphosis, while the working process and the performance itself explores various elements of Butoh and contemporary dance.

The background is inspired by science of sacred geometry, the matrix of space and time, which some believe encompass a higher knowledge and secrets of the cosmos and the soul.

A process of regeneration, death and growth, where body and time become one by allowing the body to speak for itself through unconscious and improvised movements. This process of individuation; a harmonious, balanced state of oneness; spirit, body and mind, depicting the transcendence of soul from the body or the world of matter.