Grantee Database

Alec GOLDFARB

• 2026
• Music
• United States to India

To pursue an immersive study of Hindustani classical music and expand his understanding of related South Indian approaches. Through a period of focused musical study and cultural immersion, Goldfarb will refine his approach to Indian ragas as a guitarist by learning from artists in Kolkata, Chennai, and other regions and comparing the evolution of traditions across geography, language, and performance practice. He aims to meet performers, scholars, instrument-makers, and archivists whose work intersects with his questions about intonation, tuning, and adapting classical forms to new instruments. In addition to his own growth, Goldfarb hopes that exchanges with these music communities will also advance opportunities to demonstrate how their traditions and ideas resonate on a different instrument and in a different cultural context.

Paola SINISTERRA

• 2026
• Crafts
• Hong Kong to India

To research mud-resist dyeing traditions and its industrial applications, and to refine expertise in natural dye techniques and sustainable textile processes. Sinisterra will visit and document traditional craft communities in India, focusing on mud dyeing techniques on textiles. Through participatory research, interviews, hands-on learning, and teaching, she seeks to understand local knowledge systems rooted in mud dyeing techniques for textiles. Sinisterra hopes that the fellowship will support the preservation of these textile practices and advance her goal of building an inter-Asian network of artisans and practitioners that facilitates knowledge-sharing and will explore applications of these crafts beyond consumer products.

Kenji CHIGA

• 2025
• Film/Video
• Japan to India

To engage and collaborate with local villages and individuals in Gaya in Bihar, India, and to gain a deeper understanding of the cultural significance and spiritual role of acting in their communities through filming and participation in local theater activities.

Esther LU

• 2025
• Curation
• Taiwan to India, Japan

To engage with artists, collectives, and experimental communities in eco-villages and regions in Japan and India, to explore their ecological philosophies, land ethics, and structural challenges posed by international politics.

Bridge for the Arts and Education

Country / Region:
• Japan

• 2024
• Theater
• Malaysia to Japan

To conduct a workshop series facilitated by five artists from Malaysia and Japan involving open rehearsals and artist's talks to explore the link between Asian performance and the theme of death and rebirth through philosophy, movement, and sound.

• 2021
• Theater
• Japan to Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand

A music workshop and open forum for artists from Asia coming to Japan to participate in a production of the Mahabharata that will be held as part of the official cultural events for the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo.

• 2020
• Theater
• Japan to Asia

A 6-month Organization/Project Grant to support a joint film project around Hiroshi Koike’s Mahabharata Series with participating artists from nine countries across Asia

• 2019
• Theater
• Cambodia, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Thailand to Indonesia

to support cross-cultural workshops in Jogjakarta for performing artists from Japan and Southeast Asia to create a collaborative interpretation of the Mahabharata

Briana Brightly

• 2024
• Art History
• United States to India

To investigate the relationship between religion, art, and medicine in early-modern Tibet through a study of the artist Lhodrak Tenzin Norbu's anatomical illustrations.

Asif Majid

• 2024
• Theater
• United States to India

To examine how Shi'a Muslims, Sunni Muslims, and Hindus rehearse commemorations like poetry, processions, drumming, and public mourning ahead of the first sacred month of the Islamic calendar, Muharram, and how these practices make, unmake, and remake Indian trans religious harmony.

Padmapani Perez

• 2024
• Literature
• Philippines to India

To research and engage with a literary and artistic understanding of trees around the country by visiting sacred trees that grow, thrive, and stand-out in unlikely, public, urban spaces in India.

Heeryoon Shin

• 2024
• Art History
• Korea to India

To investigate the localized reception of blue-and-white ceramics in colonial India and study the innovative architectural reuse of Chinese, Dutch, and British ceramics in Indian interiors.

Office ALB

• 2023
• Dance
• Japan to India, Philippines

To foster exchange and international collaboration among artists from Southeast- and South Asia, Japanese artists centering on choreographer/dancer Akiko Kitamura and local artists from the Philippines, India and Indonesia collaborate to conduct fieldwork and workshops together.

Chia Hsun Yuan

• 2023
• Visual Art
• Taiwan to China, India

To conduct field research on the Buddhist mural of Kucha (Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, China), Tabo and Alchi (Northern India), over a period of five months, to trace the historical practice of mural art within various cultural milieus.

Hwarng Wern Ying

Country / Region:
• Taiwan

• 2022
• Grant to Taiwan Film & Culture Association

• 2015
• Film/Video
• Taiwan to India

A four-month fellowship to visit traditionally-crafted film sets, participate in fabric and costume design workshops, and meet Indian film directors and producers