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Dear All,

The Department of Visual Arts is delighted to invite you to the second colloquium in the Visual Arts Colloquium Series, Spring 2026.

Title: Animating Memory: Narratives of Displacement and Migration

Speaker: Nina Sabnani, Animator, Educator, former HOD-Animation NID Ahmedabad

Date: Monday, 16th March, 2026

Time: 1: 30 PM

Venue: Visual Art Studio (near sports block)

Abstract: This presentation brings together three animated films that explore memory as a fragile yet persistent archive of displacement and forced migration following the Partition of India in 1947 and the aftermath of the 1971war between India and Pakistan. Drawing from personal recollections, intergenerational memories, and community narratives, the films engage with histories that remain largely absent from official records.

Through fragmentary memories of childhood friendships interrupted by violence, intimate recollections of homes and objects left behind, and the collective voices of women whose lives were shaped by migration, the films reveal how displacement continues to inhabit everyday memory. Textile practices such as appliqué and embroidery emerge as narrative forms through which experiences of migration, loss, and resilience are articulated, transforming cloth into a visual archive of lived history.

Rather than reconstructing historical events, the films attend to the emotional and sensory traces of migration—memories of separation, interrupted childhoods, and the lingering presence of places and relationships that could not travel across borders. Animation becomes a means of translating these fragile recollections into visual narratives, allowing personal and community memories to surface as alternative histories.

Together, the works suggest that memory—carried through stories, images, and stitched surfaces—can serve as a powerful medium for recalling experiences of displacement, preserving fragile inheritances, and reclaiming histories that might otherwise remain untold.

Speaker’s Bio: Nina Sabnani is an animator, illustrator, researcher, and educator whose films weave together art, storytelling, ethnography, and oral traditions. Her collaborative works with artists and folk storytellers have received national and international recognition.

A graduate of the Faculty of Fine Arts, Vadodara, and a Fulbright Fellow with a master’s degree in film from Syracuse University, New York, her doctoral research on the Kaavad storytelling tradition led to the book Kaavad Tradition of Rajasthan: A Portable Pilgrimage.

Sabnani co-founded the Animation Design programme at the National Institute of Design and later taught at IDC School of Design, IIT Bombay. She currently teaches at Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bengaluru, and UPES, Dehradun, and serves as Festival Director of the AniMela International Animation Festival.

Her honours include the National Award (Rajat Kamal) for Hum Chitra Banate Hain at the 64th National Film Awards (2016), the Big Little Book Award for Illustration (2018), the Legend of Indian Animation Award (2021), and the Ram Mohan Award of Excellence in Animation (2024).

We look forward to your active participation in the talk.

Warm regards,

Visual Arts Department