Request for Proposals: Archives and Museums Programme – India

Objectives

• The programme has a twofold objective:
  • To provide arts practitioners and researchers with an opportunity to generate new, critical and creative approaches for public engagement with archives and museum collections; and
  • To energise these spaces as platforms for dialogue and discourse.

Collections

• For this collaboration, they invite applications to work with two collections at TCRC:
  • Scholarly Projects on Lobby cards in Tamil Cinema from 1950s – 1990s: Lobby Cards, as the name suggests, were used in the lobby of cinema halls, often pinned there or distributed by the production house as publicity material to promote a film. Over the years, film lobby cards have become the most sought after film memorabilia. The materials from this collection are from Tamil cinema from 1950s to 1990s.
  • For the Scholarly Project, they encourage proposals that:
    • research and critically engage with this collection to produce research-based materials.
    • support the knowledge bank of the institution with tangible outcomes such as monographs, essays, long-form articles, descriptive catalogue etc.
    • present their research through public programmes both online and offline.
  • Creative Projects on Tamil Cinema reviews in Periodical publications from 1930s – 1990s: This collection includes reviews of Tamil Cinema published in various magazines from the 1930s to the 1990s. Some of them are annual editions while a few are from the fortnightly or weekly periodicals. Some of the reviews were written by prominent writers of those times. This collection is an important resource to encourage and explore the discourse of writing on cinema.
  • For the Creative Project, they seek proposals which:
    • demonstrate innovative curatorial and artistic intervention to reimagine this collection.
    • focus on creating creative outcomes such as physical or virtual exhibitions, film/s, podcasts and others for greater public outreach.
    • They encourage projects that think through interdisciplinary and collaborative approaches and methodologies for their outcomes.
    • Both kinds of projects are envisioned for a period of one year.

Project Budget

• The project cost should not exceed Rs 2,00,000.
• You can request for an honorarium not exceeding 35% of the proposed budget for the entire duration of the project. The total amount is inclusive of the honorarium.
• Funds will cover only project-related costs and activities, and will not pay for infrastructure costs or equipment purchase.

Eligibility Criteria

• India Foundation for the Arts (IFA) implements projects under its various programmes. The criteria for eligibility to apply under these programmes are as follows:
  • Only Indian nationals can apply. This does not include PIO (Persons of Indian Origin) and OCI (Overseas Citizen of India) Card Holders.
  • Applicants must have PAN card and one of the following for proof of identity and citizenship – Indian Passport or Aadhar Card or Voter’s ID in India.
  • Only individuals can apply. Organisations of any kind cannot apply (except for non-profit schools, who can only apply under the Arts-Integrated Projects in Schools category of the Arts Education programme).
  • If there are collaborators in the projects, they must also be Indian nationals.
  • Persons who have a past history of financial delinquency with IFA are not eligible.
  • Persons who have failed to deposit at IFA agreed deliverables from an earlier IFA grant are not eligible.
  • Persons who have previously received a letter from IFA disallowing them from applying in the future for any reason are not eligible.
  • Persons currently working on a project implemented by IFA are not eligible to apply.
  • More than one individual can apply if they have a joint account. If they do not, then only one among them should apply with the others as collaborators.

For more information, visit IFA.