Wed, 11:28: Last night Shobhit and I went to the Tasveer Film Festival launch party—this year is their 20th one!
We went to this event last year, and because it was in a new location this year, we did not quite register that it was the same launch party again. Last year it was at a space they had been using at Seattle Center. As of this year, they have a new space: the old Ark Lodge Cinemas! Because I am an idiot, I was inside there and toured through the three screens they now have before it even registered where I was. It had been a while since I had even though about the sad news of Ark Lodge Cinemas having to close last year.
There seems to be some mixed feelings about the new ownership—official since March of this year; this will now be their festival space every year, along with other programming and other space rental opportunities through the rest of the year—in the local community. But when I realized where I was, I found it pretty exciting. Tasveer is the only Oscar-qualifying South Asian Film Festival in the world, and now they only South Asian organization to own its own theater, which they managed to procure with the help of a $2.19 million grant from King County's Doors Open Program.
Anyway, more than one person recognized us from the event last year, when Shobhit and I attended wearing the traditional Indian outfits we had gotten married in—the thing people remembered most about us. We did not think to do the same this year because we did not fully realize it was the same event we were going to a year later, just at a new location. Well, maybe next year!
“Tasveer” (pronounced “tus-VEER”) is Hindi for “picture,” by the way.
(Shobhit's connection is through his membership of the SAG-AFTRA Local board, where he is eagerly working to increase what has thus far been a modest sponsorship of the festival the past couple of years.)
https://t.co/wpxud3r6XU