NFAI to host exhibition to discover, remember, share

PUNE: The National Film Archives of India (NFAI) will celebrate the World Day for Audiovisual Heritage by exhibiting a collection of posters, glass slides, lobby cards and booklets on Friday, between 10am and 6pm.

UNESCO declared October 27 as World Day for Audiovisual Heritage with the aim of spreading awareness about the importance of audio-visual archival. The theme chosen this year is Discover, Remember and Share.

"This is a good way to remember that this cultural heritage has to be preserved not just for today's generation but also for the generations to come and we have to dedicate ourselves in doing this," said NFAI director Prakash Magdum.

The NFAI, which functions as a storehouse of cinematic history, will showcase select posters from various eras of the Indian film industry.

A major highlight of the exhibition is the hand-written script of Gulacha Ganapati by PL Deshpande. The 1953 black and white movie saw Deshpande donning several hats, including that of an actor, writer, director and music composer.

The exhibition will also feature some photographs of Marathi cinema clicked by eminent still photographer S M Ajrekar, who worked for city-based studious Navyug and Prabhat Film Company.

In addition, an 8mm projector, 35mm transparency or poster slide and the song booklet of Mother India, which completed 60 years of its release this week, will be on display.