Kenya-born Shakila Taranum Maan (eMail • Web
site • blog)
found herself exiled, at age eleven, when the Ugandan government undertook the expulsion of Asians in 1972, forcing
her family to leave East
Africa and migrate to England;
she has been part of the British arts scene since the mid-1970s.
From her base in West
London, Shakila wrote, produced and directed plays,
for her own and other theatre companies, before venturing
into film production and directing. (She is a graduate of
the London
College of Communication, with a degree in Film &
Video production.)
Ferdous,
her graduation film, won Best Art Film at the Latin
American Film Festival and was screened worldwide. In
2001, Shakila's Alone Together collected the Pierre
Cardin Award for Best Art Film at the Asolo
Film Festival in Italy.
Her first feature film, A
Quiet Desperation (see poster art by clicking here),
premiered as the opener for Raindance East at the Raindance
Film Festival, London 2001, and has since screened at Cannes and the National
Film Theatre, London. Now re-titled The
Winter Of Love, it is scheduled for DVD release
this summer.
The
courage to explore daring themes in depth is a defining
feature of Shakila's work. Her writing style, like her film
style, is offbeat and contemporary, duly respectful yet
brutally honest, and true to the facts and characters.
Shakila
is also a founding member of The
Art Ministry, a London-based art publisher and agent,
which supplies galleries and other trade outlets with original
and limited edition artwork internationally sourced from
visual artists.
In
her spare time, Shakila runs her own blog, About Film;
and, on a good day, you'll find her in her garden, red faced
and raging, trying—but spectacularly failing—to
keep the invading weeds at bay.
