Call for Applications | Writing With Images

 

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As young creatives and writers, The Pomelo, The Confluence Collective and Buddha Pada understand the need to support and nourish the artists, writers and creative individuals who are keen on experimenting with different mediums.  Given that engagement with images, in incredibly diverse forms, is burgeoning in the region, we are also keen on supporting more writings about these processes. 

 

Thus, this workshop aims to support your writing as well as give you a space that acts as a sounding board for the things you want to create and write about. 
 

Who?  

This workshop is for artists, writers and researchers who are interested in working across images and textual mediums. This workshop will be ideal for someone already working on a project which they would want to publish as an essay with both visual and an accompanying textual narrative. 

 

You can apply as an individual or a duo of writer and image-maker. You can either choose to write about images that you’ve created or any personal images such as family photographs, on existing practices (preferably of artists from the Himalayan region) or select a specific archival collection (again preferably related to the Himalayan region). 

 

*This workshop is open for all, but individuals from the Eastern Himalayan region and North East will be prioritised.

 

This will be a month-long interaction with one in-person session in Kalimpong and two online sessions. During the preliminary two-day in-person workshop, we will collectively explore different ways of understanding the visual, alongside guided writing and review sessions. Following this, we will facilitate sustained engagement with participants through feedback on the first draft of the essay, multiple peer-review rounds, curated reading lists, and consistent editorial support as you work towards finalising your draft. We encourage all participants to approach the programme with the intention of publishing their piece. 

There will be a session later after your first draft on “How to pitch your essay?”

 

 What? 

This workshop will encapsulate: 

1. Researching for/visualising images for your text

2. Writing critically and creatively about images

3. Looking at the different elements of a photo-essay

4. Writing about all the images as mentioned above.

 

When? 

This workshop will be held in Kalimpong in the last week of June from 23- 26 June, 2026. If you are keen on joining this workshop, we hope that you will be available within the given dates. 

 

​We specifically want to encourage people to apply with work-in-progress which can benefit from the workshop and can culminate in a publish-ready photo essay in a month.

 

Workshop Venue - (In-person)
Buddha pada, Kalimpong 
West Bengal 

Workshop fee - 

Rs. 4,500/-
(The fee is payable only after the participant has been selected.)

The fee includes the online session, as well as a 3-night stay at Buddha Pada on a shared-room basis, along with meals.

 
Kindly note that the in-person workshop session is a residency program at Buddha Pada, Kalimpong, West Bengal. Therefore, all participants are requested to stay together.

 

Timeline
 

Open call

Last Day to Apply - 7 June, 2026 

 

Selection and confirmation

12 June, 2026

 

In-person two day- workshop (Arrival and departure) 

23-26 June, 2026

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Post workshop support to complete your draft in July

 

Session on pitching to publications

First week of August

Only 10 participants will be selected from among the applicants.

 

 Facilitators 

 
Dr Mridu K Rai is an anthropologist working at the intersections of photography, material culture, and image theory. She has worked with visual archives at institutions like the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland, and the Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, University of Cambridge.

 

Shuvangi Khadka is a writer and documentary filmmaker based out of Kathmandu. For the past three years, she has been supporting development organisations and feminist collectives to strengthen their communication strategies. She is the co-founding editor of The Pomelo. 

 

​Nangsel Sherpa is currently a faculty at Centre for Writing and Pedagogy, Krea University. She has previously worked in the development sector focussing on marginalised communities in India. She is the co-founding editor of The Pomelo. 

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