/ Program

South Asia Incubator

!!UPDATE!!

We are thrilled to introduce the amazing participants for our 2023 South Asia Incubator program!! The South Asia Incubator program is designed to create a platform for emerging and mid-career visual practitioners from across South Asia to engage with mentors and institutions from around the world.

Abdul Halik Azeez – Sri Lanka

Aungmakhai Chak – Bangladesh

Hassaan Habib Gondal – Pakistan

Ipshita Maitra – India

Parisa Azadi – Iran

Prasiit Sthapit – Nepal

Priyadarshini Ravichandran – India

Rita Khin – Myanmar

Riti Sengupta – India

Samsul Alam Helal – Bangladesh

Tripty Pakhrin Tamang – Nepal

Uma Bista – Nepal 

We are excited for the participants to meet our group of mentors and develop further collaborations in 2023-2024! 

 

PhotoKTM calls for applications for the South Asia Incubator program from emerging and mid-career lens based practitioners from Nepal, Sri Lanka, Myanmar, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iran, Maldives, Bhutan and India.

The program  is designed to create a platform for emerging and mid-career visual practitioners from across South Asia to engage with mentors and institutions from around the world who research, exhibit, publish, and support lens based practices.     

PhotoKTM will invite 10 participants through an open call to spend time with a group of mentors for 5 days from 25 Feb – 1 March 2023 in Kathmandu. Mentors will be representing their respective institutions, and will spend time with participants to learn more about their work, the socio- economic, political, and cultural contexts in which they work, offer general mentorship on how to grow their practices, approach grants, exhibitions, residencies and navigate professional ecosystems. The goal will be to hopefully ideate and develop further collaborations in 2023-2024.  

Participants will be selected through an open call. Selection jury will include PhotoKTM team members and Incubator program mentors.               

PROGRAM DETAILS

  • Participants should be of South Asian origin, living and working in South Asia.
  • The program is designed for emerging and mid-career practitioners with minimum 5 years of experience.
  • There are a maximum of 10 seats for the program this year.
  • Program is open to individuals, duos as well as collectives.
  • Participants will be asked to bring 2-3 completed or well developed projects to share and discuss. 
  • Participants are encouraged to bring prints, dummies, as well as digital presentations of their work.
  • Participants will be provided local accommodation, and a daily stipend for meals and local transport for up to 7 nights.
  • Participants will be responsible for arranging travel to and from Kathmandu at their own expense. 
  • Preference will be given to applications from practitioners who do not already have existing support systems such as galleries and agencies representing them.

PROGRAM SCHEDULE *Subject to change

  • 24 Feb – Arrive in Kathmandu in time for festival opening at 5pm
  • 25 Feb – Day 1: Group breakfast + introductions + mentors + participants present work (full day)
  • 26 Feb – Day 2: Participants continue to present work (half day)
  • 27 Feb – Day 3: One-on-one + group meetings (half day)
  • 28 Feb – Day 4: One-on-one + group meetings + wrap up (half day)
  • 1 March – Day 5: Final day of sharing + sightseeing 

*Although this program ends on 1 March, participants are welcome to extend their stays at their own expense. 

MENTORS

  1. Bindi Vora – Autograph
  2. Leandre D’Souza – Sunaparanta Goa Centre for the Arts
  3. Lucy Gallun – MoMA
  4. Michael Famighetti – Aperture
  5. Sohrab Hura – Artist
  6. Susan Meiselas – Magnum Foundation

HOW TO APPLY 

To apply for this program, please submit the following in this google form: https://forms.gle/bHJWB3woDLaKnCbB7  

  1. An updated CV (2 pages max)
  2. Your short bio (150 words max)
  3. Your profile photo with credit info in filename or file info (2000 pixels)
  4. A letter of motivation stating how you would like to grow your practice in the next 2 years, specific areas you feel you need support with, and how you would like to engage with audiences. (2 pages max)
  5. A pdf of your portfolio that includes 2-3 complete or ongoing but well-developed bodies of work along with corresponding texts, captions or links to video/sound files on youtube or Vimeo 
  6. Additional/ supporting material that tells us more about your practice, your interests, and how you like to build audience engagement (for example exhibition stills, or tearsheets of publications or dummies, etc.  
  7. Kindly send all documents as pdfs and rename them with your first name and the title of the document (Example: Meha _CV, Meha_Bio, Meha_Motivation Letter, etc

Application Deadline

3rd Feb 2023

By participating in the South Asia Incubator program, you agree to adhere to the festival’s code of conduct.                                        

Here is a video from the 2018 program. 

Frequently Asked Questions: 

We are a collective of more than 5 artists-how many of us can attend the incubator program?

We can welcome 2 artists from the collective. Daily stipend will be provided to both the artists up to 7 days

I am part of a collective but I also work as an individual/independent artist, can I apply as both? 

Yes, we encourage you to apply both as a part of a collective and as an individual/independent t artist 

Are there any grant bodies/institutions that would fund my travel?

Unfortunately we don’t know any such institutions in south asia that exclusively funds travel grants for artists but we encourage you to reach out to institutions and individuals who have supported your work  

Can I apply with works-in-progress?

Yes, however, we expect work to be well developed and not in early stages

Will the incubator program result in something tangible like exhibitions, residencies, among others?

We really hope so! We have made a concerted effort this year to invite mentors and partner institutions who are interested to work with more global practitioners. We hope the five day incubation period in Kathmandu will lead to ideas for collaboration in the two years that follow. we will follow up with all participants and mentors n regular basis and provide any additional support that we may be help with such fundraising, curating, coordinating, and cheerleading

What kind of collaboration between mentors and participants are you referring to in 2023-2024? 

Mentors and participants will have five days together in Kathmandu to get to know each other and brainstorm the possible future collaborations which would include exhibitions, publications, residences, long term mentorship. 

We encourage participants to think about collaborations with each other as well. Photo kathmandu will do its best to support ideas that develop within the period of 2023-2024 we do realise that ideas take time to materialise although we are saying 2023-2024, Photo Kathmandu is interested in continuing the conversation beyond 2024 

How do you define ‘emerging’ artists?

This program is most suited to people who have had experience of minimum five years. If you feel you have a project that you are ready to share with global audiences but do not have the support system (galleries, agencies) to help you get your work out there then this program is suitable for you.