Manifest Dance-Film Festival

Manifest Dance-Film Festival South Asia's only international dance-film festival takes place annually in Pondicherry, India

17/04/2026

The 5th edition of MANIFEST, South Asia’s only ANNUAL INTERNATIONAL DANCE-FILM FESTIVAL, will take place from 29th July to 2nd August 2026.

Submissions are open for all categories - shorts, mid and feature length dance-films and dance-docs

In addition there are separate submission categories for Student dance-films and dance-films shot on mobile phones.

Regular Deadline: 7th May 2026
Late Deadline: 12th June 2026
Submit via filmfreeway.com/Dance-Film
(or submit through the link is in our profile)

Clips used from Manifest 2025 official selection films:

Directions to the other side of the world by Derrick Belcham
Ode to Age by Kati Kallio
Snake in the grass by Fu Le .tetrapode .le.danse
Pooling by Dawn Westlake
The Sea by Douglas Phillip Rosenberg
Kucha by Chenglong Tang
100 M by Monika Szpunar
Lizard Song by Jonah Belsky, ArVejon Jones, Ames Tierney, David Rosenthal, Sarah R Rosenthal
Mama Dancers by Jingqiu Guan, Yang Tao .guan
Never Lost by Li Chiao-Ping

An article by Mr. Dinesh Verma in yesterday's edition of The Hindu Looking forward to the Focus India package today with...
28/03/2026

An article by Mr. Dinesh Verma in yesterday's edition of The Hindu

Looking forward to the Focus India package today with screenings of a variety of quality dance-films from India's new spark of dance-film energy. An extended program of the India focus can be accessed all over the world through the Cinedans Web online edition until April 5th.
https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/puducherry/artist-duo-from-city-to-lead-masterclass-at-amsterdams-cinedans-film-fete/article70788302.ece

.ramamurthi

Amazing opening night with a touch of India by and and groovy bollywood remixes by at the Amsterdam. Special Focus ...
26/03/2026

Amazing opening night with a touch of India by and and groovy bollywood remixes by at the Amsterdam.

Special Focus India, a package of films curated by Ashavari and Abhyuday (co-founders of Manifest Dance-Film Festival) in collaboration with Cinedans screens on Saturday 28th at 4:30pm.

Wonderful to see clips from A Snake In The Grass by Fu Le .tetrapode starring Tara and Mukul being projected at the entrance and in the opening night package.

Your point of view becomes a shared point of view at Manifest.Submit your films by the 16th of January to get the early ...
24/12/2025

Your point of view becomes a shared point of view at Manifest.

Submit your films by the 16th of January to get the early bird discount.

Further discounts are available for Manifest alumni, and if your film has screened at other festivals or won an award. Please check our Filmfreeway page for further details

www.filmfreeway.com/Dance-Film

Thanking for the write up , handwoven at the award ceremony , friends/jury members , Leeds old picture house EXT. ,...
16/11/2025

Thanking for the write up , handwoven at the award ceremony , friends/jury members , Leeds old picture house EXT. , Leeds old picture house INT., autumn leaves in the woods after a morning drizzle...

Wonderful experience at Leeds International Film FestivalThank you Two of our incredible jury members Lorand (Choreosc...
15/11/2025

Wonderful experience at Leeds International Film Festival

Thank you

Two of our incredible jury members Lorand (Choreoscope Film Festival) from Barcelona and Ashavari (Manifest Festival) in India, visiting the iconic Leeds Hyde Park Picture House to watch some of this years Leeds Shorts!

Happy to share that Ashavari a.k.a Vajrasara (Director, Manifest Dance-Film Festival) is jury member at. LIFF Screen d...
05/11/2025

Happy to share that Ashavari a.k.a Vajrasara (Director, Manifest Dance-Film Festival) is jury member at. LIFF Screen dance this year and will be announcing the awards along with Lorand Janos (Director, Choreoscope) at the award ceremony/screening in Leeds on the 8th of November.

Meet the 2025 Jury…

First up we have Ashavari Majumdar a.k.a Vajrasara the co-founder and Director of MANIFEST Dance-Film Festival, Pondicherry, India. She is an artist working across movement, text and image in multiple genres with a focus on dance-films. Ashavari is interested in post-colonial representations of Indian dance. 

Next up… Douglas Rosenberg (MFA, San Francisco Art Institute) the Vilas Distinguished Professor of Art at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is an artist and a theorist working with performance, video, installation whose work has been exhibited internationally for over 30 years in museums, festivals, galleries and elsewhere. He is the author of Screendance: Inscribing the Ephemeral Image, published by Oxford Press and The Oxford Handbook of Screendance Studies, for which he was awarded the Oscar G. Brockett Book Prize for Dance Research and he is a founding editor of The International Journal of Screendance. 

Finally returning jury member Claudia Kappenberg (Dr.), who was a huge part of the 10 Year Anniversary celebrations for LIFF Screendance last year! Claudia is an artist, writer and curator. Originally a dancer she worked extensively with Hilde Holger (1905 – 2001) and continues to explore choreographic strategies through live performance, participatory installations and films. Working with the gestures and rhythms of the everyday, her projects interrogate that which makes us human. She is an Honorary Fellow of The University of Brighton and founder-editor of The International Journal of Screendance. 

These incredible people have watched all the films and come up with a winner, but don’t worry as an audience member you can still vote for your favourite film and crown someone ‘The Audience Winner’.





We don't know you. You came for the festival and something made you smile, laugh, cry, or just stay silent. Something mo...
17/10/2025

We don't know you. You came for the festival and something made you smile, laugh, cry, or just stay silent. Something moved you. Maybe a film you saw from Poland or Indonesia, maybe a conversation with someone from Rajasthan or Sweden.

We are putting your photos here because your expressions are the essence of five years of Manifest. These are the moments that keep us going.
If you recognize yourself, or a friend - please write to us in the comments.

And if you've been inspired like so many have after coming to Manifest - to make a dance-film - then submit it, Now's the time to get the early bird discount until 24 Nov.

We are very excited to present the 2nd set of films running for the first ever Indian Competition of Dance-Films. Manife...
03/08/2025

We are very excited to present the 2nd set of films running for the first ever Indian Competition of Dance-Films.

Manifest is proud to provide a platform specifically for Indian dance-films and we invite you to come and support the growing Indian dance-filmmaking community. The screening will start at 7:10pm on Sunday, 3rd August.

The films are:
Bodies have stories, India (Dir: Mayuri Upadhya)
The Fluid Man, India (Dir: Sangram Mukhopadhyay)
Gaze, India (Dir: Pritha K)
Poetics of the mundane, India (Dir: Deepanwita Roy)
Bhramari, India (Dir: Sugandh Lamba, Siddharth Kumar)
Gotipua Krida, India (Dir: Param P. Tomanec)

Manifest would like to acknowledge the support of Deepanwita Roy in curating and providing the films 'Overspill', 'The Fluid Man' and 'Poetics of the mundane' competing in this category.

The overall festival dates and timings are as follows:

Friday 1st August - 7pm to 8:30pm
Saturday 2nd August - 1pm to 8:30 pm
Sunday, 3rd August - 2:30pm to 8:30pm

Venue: Alliance Francaise Pondicherry

International Competition of Dance-Film Shorts program 5 has 8 films from China, US, Australia, ITaly, UK, France and In...
02/08/2025

International Competition of Dance-Film Shorts program 5 has 8 films from China, US, Australia, ITaly, UK, France and Indonesia.

The screening is at 6:10 pm on Sunday, 3rd August

The films are: 

Kucha, China (Dir: Chenglong Tang )

Zero Sum Game, USA (Dir: Scott Cook, Liz Dibble)

The other side of me, Italy (Dir:  Krzysztof Bulzacki Bogucki)

Hiphop Puree, Australia (Dir:  Ryan Renshaw )

Too many, France (Dir: John Degois)

Cunduk, Indonesia (Dir: Agnes Widyasmoro)

Totem, France (Dir: Emeline Castaneda)

Don't say my name , UK (Dir: Shobana Jeyasingh, Teresa Griffiths)

The remaining festival dates and timings are as follows:

Saturday 2nd August - 1pm to 8:30 pm

Sunday, 3rd August - 2:30pm to 8:30pm

Address

Pondicherry

Opening Hours

Monday 9am - 5pm
Tuesday 9am - 5pm
Wednesday 9am - 5pm
Thursday 9am - 5pm
Friday 9am - 5pm
Saturday 9am - 5pm

Website

https://www.auroapaar.org/festival

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