Bawa’s Garden is a road movie in search of the work of renowned Sri Lankan architect Geoffrey Bawa. The film follows a protagonist scouring the island for the ‘lost’ garden of Lunuganga. Finding the treasure might be the goal, yet her search is the catalyst for encounters with a series of characters and rarely visited buildings that reveal the story of Bawa’s life and work. Shot across Sri Lanka, this experimental documentary weaves dreamlike narratives with real life characters intrinsic to the output of this renowned 20th-century architect. This alternative docudrama is tantamount to the eclectic and quietly moving work of Bawa’s buildings and gardens, and the collaborators that influenced his oeuvre. It’s a journey to the heart of the island and the soul of what it is to be an architect and a filmmaker.

Expanding the architectural documentary genre, the film’s rhythm is a composition of research material, performance and interviews. Conceived like a building -- with a distinct spatial presence -- sequences are constructed to augment the experience of the rooms and landscapes the protagonist visits in her search for the mystical garden of Lunuganga. Breaking away from a dogmatic western understanding of space , the film celebrates the power of architecture on our senses, while exploring otherness and the nature of human memory.

Writer & Director
Clara Kraft Isono
Producer
Corinne Mynatt
Executive Producer
Kate Wilson
Cast
Lea D’Albronn Allexandre
Interviewees (in order of appearance)
Anjalendran Chelvadurai
Dominic Sansoni
Kengo Kuma
Channa Daswatte
Amila de Mel
Sumangala Jayatilaka
Dilshan Ferdinando
Sunethra Bandaranaike
Sister Francine
Chandra Aluwihare
Laki Senanayake
Director of Photography
Daniel Chaytor
Editors
Elisa Cepedal Garcia
Clara Kraft Isono
Music Composition
Jasmin Kent Rodgman
Performed by
Mandhira de Saram
First Camera Assistant
Manuel Fernandes Seixas de Sa
Second Camera Assistant
Praveen Paranagamage
Sound
Sunjna Mullick
Sound Design
Lars Knudsen
Postproduction
OKAY Studios