Harish Saluja is an Indian-American who came to the USA in the early 70’s after getting an engineering degree from one of the most prestigious Indian institutions, IIT Kharagpur. After spending some time here in the USA, he realized that people in America weren’t much informed about Asia and Asians and that the Americans were unaware of the rich cultural heritage of the Indian subcontinent.
In his quest for cultural connection, Harish Saluja ran a radio program called ‘The Music of India’ with his friend for more than 30 years. And his passion for films led him to start ‘The Silk Screen Film Festival’ that showcased Asian and Asian-Americans films. He believed that the film festival will help him make the mainstream Americans understand India and Asia better. He even got seed money of $15000 by the then governor of Pennsylvania, Ed Rendell, to start the festival. He worked in Tony Buba’s ‘No Pets’ (1994) as an associate producer and later as the executive producer of film ‘Dog eat Dog’. Saluja wrote, directed and produced ‘The Journey’ (1997), a comical drama. The movie was premiered at the Seattle Film Festival in 1997 and screened in 20 festivals nationwide.
In addition to working on films, Harish Saluja is also an artist who has produced many works of abstract art combining colors and musical patterns. His work of art includes both miniatures (3×5 inches abstract pieces) as well as large paintings. He has recently started incorporating these miniatures in handbags under the brand name Indigo Art Bags. This brand is slowly garnering attention due to its unique feature of having an original piece of art.
