The Ways of Seeing

Every artist should be free to follow the path that an idea presents

- Bharatbala

I'M a filmmaker, and I am exceptionally liberated-I don't stick to a medium or a format to manifest my ideas. Let's take Virtual Bharat, my on-going 1,000film journey to showcase an India never-seen, never heard before. It's the free India that looks ordinary but leads an extraordinary life. At heart, we're narrating stories, but the format is new. Every artist should be free to follow the path that an idea chooses to manifest itself with.

Freedom? How do I relate to it? And to the word, 'creativity'? It all rolls back to a conversation that my dad, V Ganapathy, had with me, many years ago. It was late 1990s. I was in my early 30s. My dad asked me, "Can you create an idea that can inspire a generation?" Till that time, my only exposure was advertising. Everything I knew was narrated in 30 seconds. That conversation with my dad opened doors for change. I wanted to embrace an idea, and not so much the form...my mind was free.

Who knew that a conversation with my father would birth Maa Tujhe Salaam-Vande Mataram? One of the first questions in my mind was how should I express it, manifest it? I wanted to find a way to identify with the idea. I reached out to an artist, a friend, Thota Tharani. I asked him, "How does the flag instil energy and fervour into someone young who sees it?" He created a six-foot painting of the flag which had a new expression, energy, vitality, and fervour.

The umbrella idea opened up a canvas. As a filmmaker and an advertising professional, I needed that one hook, that emotionally-stirring packshot that could resonate. Honestly, I couldn't think of a better packshot than our tricolour. I got a huge flag made, and filmed it at the best studio in London in slow motion (1000-frames-per-second). It looks magnificent to everyone who sees it even today.