Roopa Gogineni: Suddenly TV

Image: Videostill from Roopa Gogineni, Suddenly TV, 2022, video, 18:41 Min., color, sound. Courtesy of the artist

In April 2019, after the fall of President Omar al-Bashir, Sudanese from across the country congregate in Khartoum to demand civilian rule. Demonstrators occupy the military headquarters. Weeks pass and the besieged protest grows into a utopian settlement with library tents, communal kitchens, concerts and health clinics. In this liminal space, a group of young revolutionaries create an imaginary television station to meet fellow protestors. What begins as play becomes an urgent conjuring of a new Sudan.

“My process was to follow the boys with little interference. Crowds formed around them, their make-believe manifesting real audiences, surfacing long-suppressed stories and voices from across Sudan. Revolution is made possible by a collective suspension of disbelief. The film, like the movement itself, has no central protagonist. It is a portrait of a protest that hundreds of thousands of Sudanese collectively built.” (Roopa Gogineni)

Proposed by Silke Schönfeld in the context of her solo exhibition You Can’t Make This Up at the HMKV Hartware MedienKunstVerein at the Dortmunder U, Level 3 (12 Oct 2024–02 Feb 2025)

Roopa Gogineni

Roopa Gogineni is a Paris-based filmmaker and photographer. For a decade she lived in Nairobi where she developed a collaborative practice, working alongside communities of resistance across the region. Her films, described as intimate and urgent, have premiered at festivals including IDFA, SXSW, Hot Docs and Sheffield Doc/Fest. I am Bisha (2018), her documentary chronicling a satirical puppet show in rebel-held Sudan, received the Oscar-qualifying Full Frame Award for Best Short and a Rory Peck Award. Suddenly TV (2022), her latest short film about magical thinking and revolution, earned the 2023 SXSW Special Jury Award and the 2023 IndieLisboa Short Film Grand Prize. She has directed documentaries for The New York Times, BBC and Al Jazeera and has led projects supported by CatchLight, Logan Nonfiction, FRONTLINE/Firelight and Chicken & Egg Pictures.