Meet Vibha Kulkarni | Film Director, Writer, Actress

We had the good fortune of connecting with Vibha Kulkarni and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Vibha, what led you to pursuing a creative path professionally?
I was born and raised in India, the rich and diverse land of art and storytelling, from mythology to Bollywood, a buffet of rich food for imagination! I grew up listening to mythological stories. Imagination and daydreaming have been significant parts of my childhood experiences. Art is the only tool to bridge the rich realm of imagination and reality. I started drawing and painting at a very young age, perhaps before I learned to even speak, and often made self-portraits to express my experiences. In high school, I wanted to be an astronaut or a scientist until I discovered that a career in the arts was even possible.

I was quite an introvert, living in my own imaginary world for most of my life. Storytelling was the only way to connect with people and even fall in love with people in the ‘real’ world. I explored different storytelling media.
I started as a painter and sculptor. Through an art residency, I explored New Media, and audio-visual installations which I went ahead to study further. I also wrote stories, skits, and poetry, which led to my enrolling in theater workshops. In art school, I got into performance art and social experiments to study my body as an artwork, a storytelling medium. I also trained for the Indian classical dance forms Kathak, Bharatanatyam, and Odissi. I felt spiritually more connected to my inner self with each artistic medium.

I was highly drawn to film and video when I acted in a short film. I was never a film buff, but I found it to be the most powerful medium that has the potential to communicate with the masses which other mediums of art could not. I found my ultimate storytelling medium, which could make anyone empathize, laugh, cry, and emote even those emotions people would typically mask. Films make people more human, more real, and that is the beauty of it!

Art has been my way of life, so I cannot even imagine an alternate career to the one I am in! And as a storyteller and Filmmaker, I am indeed privileged to have the opportunity to work on my craft here in Hollywood, the Mecca of Film Making.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
My journey has been quite a roller coaster, both in terms of my meandering career path to the social challenges and pressures around me as a South Asian woman that caused all that meandering. But that’s the best part: every twist and turn has an invaluable lesson. When I was young and naive, doing my undergrad in art school, I was highly drawn to film-making, but the film industry appeared daunting. I overcame that fear by immersing myself in trying every other storytelling medium, which was the best thing I ever did. Professionally, I started as a sculptor, then a new media artist, while tip-toeing as a performance artist and an actress. I worked as a UX Designer at a corporate company which helped me become more worldly-wise(which I was not). After that, I taught Interaction Design to Undergrad Communication Design students to earn a living and support my indie short films and theater practice. On the side, I did internships at Bollywood Production Houses, where I gained a treasure house of insights that gave me a lot of clarity leading me to my dream school – AFI!

Financial challenges constantly put my mind to work and helped me discover more skill sets, but the social challenges pushed me to my breaking point. On the work front, whether back in India or here in LA, sexism is one of the biggest challenges I have always faced, especially as a woman with a gentle voice and small demeanor. The only way I learned to overcome such challenges is by continuing to create more work and believing that my contribution to storytelling is even more valuable because this is precisely why we need more female voices to change that. Academically, when I immersed myself in a two-year-long research about Identity and Dance for my Interactive Dance Thesis project at NID back in India, I learned how everything that we think is ours, including our identities, dreams, and desires, is only a construct and a result of our social conditioning. That changed my way of approaching life and my art. I am also a regular meditation practitioner, so I strongly believe nothing is permanent and everything is a lesson. So each social challenge, only makes me closer to the complexity of humanness. I actually love how it transforms me and helps me reconstruct myself over and over again to face a new world each day.

Before Films, I always made self-portraits of time phases that were reflective of my emotional transitions through phases of life. My performance art and social experiments too were to study the world around me through the lens of my own emotional journey. I also published a poetry book titled Thoughts of a Thoughtless Mind – A collection of 48 reflective poems about an inner journey of the mind observing a broad spectrum of emotions.

Now, each film I create reflects my life phase during its development as I often complete my own character arc towards the project’s completion. I am seldom the same person at the end of the project as I was at the start of it. I even often physically change my appearance or hairstyle to signify that change, lol. As a single woman in my 30s, I currently feel the typical pressures of marriage and motherhood racing toward me like bullets with each passing day. I’ve been channeling those pressures into my stories effectively. The more the pressure, the more the stories!

I am most excited about the projects I am currently working on, including the three feature films I am developing and my AFI thesis film, ARO’s WORLD, which is about to go into production. I love telling coming-of-age stories with themes revolving around self-discovery, self-reflection, and self-acceptance. Change begins within, and the message I would love to give out to the world through my films is to look within themselves for the things they seek outside, whether it is love, acceptance, forgiveness, validation, or even happiness.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Well, first I would take them to Griffith Observatory to see the beautiful sky and view the hills and the city! Then I would take them to Cafe Gratitude, Bricks and Scones, Alcove cafe, Bombay Palace, and Van Leeuwen icecream joint to eat. Walk down Sunset and Hollywood boulevard, and watch a movie at the Chinese theatre. And definitely spend a lot of time at the beaches to enjoy the sunset!

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?

Well, wow! I have nothing but gratitude for every step and every phase of my life and all the people that I have encountered on my way and the list is way too long! My family – my parents, my grandparents, and my brother, I must say has been my backbone and biggest support through everything. My childhood friends group, whom we call the ‘GOGs’ – Girls of Geetanjali (My residence back home) has fueled my storytelling abilities. They are incredibly talented girls! We used to stage plays and choreograph dance sequences together, which sowed the seeds of my dream of becoming an Actor, a Writer, and now a Director. They were my first Drama School, Dance School, and Film School right from childhood!

I have always been blessed to encounter mentors at every stage throughout my academic life. I want to thank all my teachers, instructors, and mentors from St. Joseph’s Convent – Bandra, St. Xavier’s College – Bombay, College of Fine Arts – Bangalore, National Institute of Design – India, and of course The American Film Institute Conservatory – Los Angeles.

When I was in Xavier’s, Fr. Terry was such an inspiration. Just being around him I learned that there is literally nothing we cannot do if we put our mind to it! Over a decade, I saw it for myself, nothing is impossible. Being here in LA in my dream school appeared next to impossible and unimaginable for me back then. But now, I realize dreams do come true and they lay a path for bigger and better dreams. When I say bigger, it is no longer a personal dream, but one that becomes a shared dream, with a purpose. Fr. Terry still is such an inspiration and support to me! His acts have always been acts of service, with bigger dreams and a sense of purpose, touching the lives of so many! And my, he is a great storyteller himself! In Bangalore, I met my mentors Dr. Prem Muthu and Dr. Amrutha Muthu whose belief and immense support in me over a decade has helped me grow from a photography model, to an actress to a director, while also evolving into a wiser human being!

My M.Des Program in New Media Design at NID (The National Institute of Design, India) has been a major contributor to shaping my artistic voice by teaching me the art of ‘unlearning’ which is the most valuable gem I hold all my life. My class in NID, a bunch of fourteen other talented weirdos like me, were all crazy about learning and growing and are still like family to me, though we are all creators in extremely different career paths in different parts of the world today. I would especially thank my mentor Dr. Jignesh Khakhar who believed in us and taught us that each of us has a role to play in this world, to leave an impact and bring about a change. I am forever grateful for that experience, because today, I feel so glad to not feel an ounce of competition in such a highly competitive environment because I see how significantly different and important each creator’s voice and contribution to this world is. I want to say a big thank you to him and my whole NMD family as well as my NID community!

I give credit to all my collaborators, friends, and extended family who have always been there for me through challenges and to celebrate joys and beautiful life moments. They have been a fruit to my soul as an artist to thrive. I wish I could name them all but the list is never-ending!

I would also like to thank the city of Los Angeles! This beautiful city has helped me feel at home and helped me rediscover myself here which has greatly influenced my storytelling voice. The most beautiful skies and sunsets I’ve ever seen! No kidding! The skies deserve all the inspiration credit for the beauty in my stories!

Website: https://iveeba.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iveeba/

Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/iveeba/

Image Credits
Ajay Sahu Santiago Serrano Pascale R. Williams Jenise Whitehead Krushan Naik Prem Muthu