15/09/2026
Amshu Chukki is an artist and filmmaker whose work moves across film, drawing, sound, text, and installation. His practice explores how landscapes, languages, and archives carry the traces of political, ecological, and social transformation. Through long-term research and collaboration, he examines how history remains embedded in landscapes, cities, literature, politics, architecture, performance, sound, and everyday life.
The Grunt and The Wail is an ongoing project that takes Tipu’s Tiger, an 18th-century wooden automaton made for Tipu Sultan, as its point of departure. Its mechanism produces two distinct sounds: the grunt of a tiger and the wail of the European soldier pinned beneath it. Through performance, breath, voice, gesture, and collective movement, multiple bodies reimagine these mechanical sounds and movements as a bodily and sonic score.
Filmed in Srirangapatna, the former capital of Tipu Sultan and the site of his death in 1799, the work brings the object back into proximity with the landscape from which its histories emerged.
The project was developed with the support of Nirdigantha and shot at their site near Srirangapatna. Nirdigantha is a theatre incubator and experimental arts space founded by actor and filmmaker Prakash Raj on the banks of the Lokapavani River. Conceived as a space for theatre practitioners to experiment and collaborate, it brings together rehearsal, performance, workshops, and residential working.
With the support of Nirdigantha and the Prakash Raj Foundation.
Join the premiere during Open Studios, 23-25.10.2026
📸 / Credits
Performers
Damini Dhanraj .dhanraj
Geeta Mohite
H. C. Manjunatha .chandru_
Harshini Boyalla .bo
Junafar Juno
Munna Mysuru .mysuru
Shruthi M.
Choreography & Body Movement Facilitation
Anisha Tavag
Vocal & Sonic Facilitation
Shalom Sannutha .music
Cinematography
Achyuth B S
Assistant Cinematographer
Keerthi Vasan .sr
Sound
SG Krishnamurthy
Video Documentation
Nobin Thomas
