INDIAN PHOTOGRAPHY FESTIVAL - HYDERABAD 2019

PHOTOGRAPHY GRANT 2019

The Indian Photography Festival (IPF) Grant is designed to support an Indian photographer in completing an ongoing photographic project in India.

The IPF Grant recipient will receive INR 3,00,000 for the production of the proposed project. The winner will also get to exhibit and present their work at the festival's 2020 edition. They will have access to workshops and portfolio reviews at the 2019 edition and possible opportunities for exhibition at partner photo festivals across the world.

Eligibility:

The grant is open to both professional and emerging Indian photographers over 18 years of age. Applicants should be able to demonstrate a proven ability to produce cohesive long-form documentary or photojournalistic essays with strong imagery. The proposed project should be an ongoing one and not have won more than INR 1,00,000 in support from other grants and/or awards in the previous calendar year.

How to apply:

There is no application fee for the grant. Each photographer may apply with only one proposal. Applicants are required to submit the following details using the online form here. Please do not email us any applications.

• Project statement (300-500 words).
• Bio (150-200 words).
• A private or public link to an earlier body of work of 15-30 images with captions.
• A private or public link to 15-30 images from the proposed project with captions.
• Budget proposal detailing how the grant money will be put to use. Please note the grant amount cannot be used to purchase new camera equipment or towards the production of a book/exhibition. We encourage photographers to budget for some honorarium as well.

Incomplete applications will be rejected. Email us at info@indianphotofest.com for any questions.

The Fine Print:

The duration of the grant is ten months from the date of announcement of the recipient. The recipient is expected to submit 30 images at the end of the grant period, of which at least 20 images must have been produced during the grant period.

The photographer receives INR 1,50,000 immediately upon the announcement of the grant, INR 75,000 upon mid-term review to the satisfaction of the jury and the final INR 75,000 upon submitting the final set of 40 images.The recipient shall be responsible for any tax liability arising from acceptance of the grant.

The recipient keeps all copyright to work produced with the grant's support, but agrees to credit the grant in any online/print publication, exhibition or social media posts for a duration of one year following the end of the grant period.

The recipient also agrees to not publish or exhibit the images from the project during the grant period, before the exhibition at the festival's 2020 edition. This includes any online and social media publications. They may however post updates from the field on their social media channels, mentioning/tagging the IPF handles on the respective platforms.

Providing false or misleading info during the application cycle and failure to abide by the grant's conditions will lead to immediate termination of our association with the recipient and withdrawal of all support.

Jury

• 

  P. Sainath

  Journalist

×

P. Sainath

Journalist

In a 34-year career as a journalist, Sainath - the former Rural Editor of the Hindu -- has won over 40 global and national awards for his reporting (and turned down several, including the Padma Bhushan because, in his view, journalists should not be receiving awards from governments they cover and critique). He is the winner of the Ramon Magsaysay Award in 2007, for Journalism Literature and Creative Communications Arts. He was the first reporter in the world to win Amnesty International's Global Human Rights Journalism Prize in its inaugural year in 2000. He was also the first Indian reporter to win the European Commission's Lorenzo Natali Prize for human rights journalism in 1995. Apart from the 40 plus print media awards, two documentary films on his work, 'Nero's Guests' and A Tribe of his Own,' have between them picked up over 20 awards across the globe.
 Read more

• 

  Srinivas Kuruganti

  Photographer

×

Srinivas Kuruganti

Photographer

Srinivas Kuruganti is a Bombay-based photographer, who has lived and worked in New York and London. His work focuses on environmental issues, ranging from ship-breaking to coal mining. In 2001, he worked on a long-term photo essay on the AIDS epidemic in India. Over the last few years, he has been archiving his photographs of 30 years of travels in India, America, and Europe. He is developing three photo books based on his archives. He is the former photo editor at The Caravan magazine, India's foremost magazine for long-form journalism, on politics and culture.  Read more

• 

  Rishi Singhal

  Photographer/Educator

×

Rishi Singal

Photographer/Educator

Rishi Singhal is the head of the masters programme in Photography Design at the National Institute of Design, Gandhinagar. He has received his education from the Centre for Environmental Planning & Technology (CEPT), Ahmedabad, Visual Studies Workshop (VSW), Rochester, NY, and the College of Visual & Performing Arts at Syracuse University, NY. He is interested in history, environment, psychology, and human condition.   Read More

Timeline

• Call for entries open - 15 July 2019
• Submission deadline - 24 August 2019
• Shortlist announcement - 5 September 2019
• Announcement of winner- 19 September 2019

• 

  Carol Guzy

  Photo Journalist

×
Carol Guzy
Photo Journalist
Carol Guzy was born in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania and lived there until 1978 when she completed her studies at Northampton County Area Community College, graduating with an Associate's degree in Registered Nursing. A change of heart led her to the Art Institute of Fort Lauderdale in Florida to study photography. She graduated in 1980 with an Associate in Applied Science degree in Photography.
While at the Art Institute, she interned at The Miami Herald and upon graduation was hired as a staff photographer. She spent eight years at the newspaper before moving to Washington, DC in 1988 where she became a staff photographer at The Washington Post through 2014. She is currently freelance.
She is the only journalist to ever receive a fourth Pulitzer for coverage of the Haitian earthquake in 2010. Previously she was honored twice with the Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography for her coverage of the military intervention in Haiti and the devastating mudslide in Armero, Colombia. She has received a third Pulitzer Prize for Feature Photography for her work in Kosovo. She has been named Photographer of the Year for the National Press Photographers Association three times and eight times for the White House News Photographers Association and has earned many other prestigious awards in her chosen profession of photojournalism. She specializes on long-form documentary human interest projects, news and feature stories, both domestic and international and is currently a contract photographer with Zuma Press.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  George Steinmetz

  Photographer - National Geographic

×
George Steinmetz
Photographer - National Geographic
George Steinmetz is an American photographer best known for aerial photography. He has worked for the world's premier publications for over thirty years. George has published four books of his photography: African Air, Empty Quarter, Desert Air, and New York Air.
Born in Beverly Hills in 1957, George graduated from Stanford University with a degree in Geophysics. A self-taught photographer, he began his career in photography by hitchhiking through Africa for 28 months with a French dictionary. Steinmetz has a restless curiosity for the unknown, and has explored subjects ranging from the remotest stretches of Arabia's Empty Quarter to the unknown tree people of Western New Guinea. Much of his early aerial work was done with a foot-launched motorized paraglider, which he pilots while taking pictures. He has worked with all kinds of aircraft, and currently uses drones to document his long-term project on the global food supply.
Since 1986, George has completed more than 40 major photo essays for National Geographic and 25 stories for GEO magazine in Germany. George has won numerous awards for photography, including three prizes from World Press Photo, and the Environmental Vision award from Pictures of the Year for his work on large-scale agriculture for the New York Times Magazine.
George lives in Glen Ridge, New Jersey, with his wife, Wall Street Journal editor Lisa Bannon, their daughter, Nell, and twin sons John and Nicholas.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Rachael Strecher

  Director of Storytelling Grants and Fellowships at the National Geographic Society

  ×

  Rachael Strecher

  Director of Storytelling Grants and Fellowships at the National Geographic Society

  Rachael Strecher is Director of Storytelling Grants and Fellowships at the National Geographic Society, where she leads grant making to support photographers, writers, film makers, data visualization experts, cartographers and other storytellers. Prior to her time at National Geographic, she launched and ran the Aspen Institute's New Voices Fellowship, a program designed to bring expert voices from the developing world into the global development discussion. Rachael began her career as a photojournalist in the Middle East, where she covered stories for the Associated Press and other outlets. She has a particular interest in innovative media and expanding the roster of who tells the world's stories.

  • Instagram

• 

  Jyothy Karat

  Photographer and Filmmaker

×
Jyothy Karat
Photographer and Filmmaker
Jyothy Karat is a documentary photographer and filmmaker, based out of Bangalore with over a decade of experience in the field. She covers subjects related to ecological justice. Her documentary work includes stories about forest conservation, human-animal conflict, displacement of indigenous communities and water pollution in India. One of her most recent projects explores the human-elephant interactions in Kerala and the concerns that arise from the complexities of the management of captive elephants in the state.
Jyothy's work documenting life in the Nilgiris Biosphere is part of UNESCO's Global campaign to influence policymakers and global leaders to make green initiatives (here). Her work was exhibited at the UN headquarters in New York and in Geneva and at the UNESCO headquarters in Paris. Her photographs were also shown during the COP21 conference in France and subsequently in Morocco, Belgium, and Portugal. Jyothy's latest exhibition about education transforming lives in the Nilgiris opened at the United Nations Headquarters in NewYork on July 1, 2019.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Alexa Keefe

  Sr. Photo Editor - National Geographic

×
Alexa Keefe
Sr. Photo Editor - National Geographic
Alexa Keefe is a Senior Photo Editor for National Geographic magazine in Washington, D.C. She first joined National Geographic in 2011 as a photography producer and the became editor of Proof, National Geographic's award-winning digital series highlighting the experiences of visual storytellers from around the world. She currently photo edits Wildlife Watch, National Geographic's investigative series related to wildlife crime, and stories focused on natural history.
She started her career at U.S. News and World Report, where she was a photo archivist and photo editor from 2001-2010.
Keefe's passion for storytelling began at a young age with creative writing, followed by a degree in French literature from the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her passion has found its truest expression in shaping and discovering visual narratives for real-life stories.
• Twitter

• 

  Richard Drew

  Staff Photographer - AP

×
Richard Drew
Staff Photographer - AP
Most photojournalists would consider themselves lucky to take one iconic picture during their career. Pulitzer prize winner Richard Drew has shot many during nearly five decades as a front-row witness to history.
Drew is best known for taking The Falling Man photograph during the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks, which appears on many critic's lists as one of the ten most important photographs of all time. He was also one of only four photographers present in the hotel kitchen when Robert. F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1968 - a year in which he also covered the violent clashes outside the Chicago Democratic convention.
As a staff photographer for The Associated Press in New York, Drew has interspersed spot news assignments with ongoing coverage of the United Nations, Wall Street, designer fashion shows, presidential campaigns, major league baseball, the Belmont Stakes, Kentucky Derby, and U.S. Open Tennis. He has photographed notables ranging from Queen Elizabeth, Nelson Mandela, Marlon Brando, Wilt Chamberlain, Willie Mays, Pele, Golda Meir, and Shirley MacLaine, to John Lennon & Yoko Ono, Sophia Loren, Frank Sinatra and Jackie Kennedy Onassis, her daughter Caroline and son John Jr., Mick Jagger, Yasir Arafat and Fidel Castro - as well as every U.S. president since Lyndon B. Johnson.
His foreign assignments include the U.S. invasion of Grenada, the Falklands War between Argentina and Britain, the Moscow, Montreal and Athens Olympics, a volcanic eruption that buried a town in Colombia, Miss Universe pageants in El Salvador, Peru and the Dominican Republic, the Ali-Foreman "Rumble in the Jungle" fight in Zaire, Prince Charles' tour of Mexico, Princess Diana's getaway with her two young sons in St. Kitts & Nevis, and a plane crash that killed almost 200 German tourists in the Dominican Republic.
Drew's work is represented in the permanent collections of New York's Museum of Modern Art and the national Newseum in Washington DC. He is a n-winner of the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for feature photography and has been honored by the World Press Photo organization in The Hague, the National Press Photographers Assn., the New York Press Photographers Assn., The Associated Press Managing Editors and The Associated Press Sports Editors.
He has been married for more than three decades and is the father of four.


• 

  Senthil Kumaran

  Visual Storyteller

×
Senthil Kumaran
Visual Storyteller
Senthil Kumaran is an independent visual storyteller from South India. He holds an engineering degree in IT but an immense interest in visual arts from his childhood led him to pursue a full-time career in photography. His work focuses on social, environmental issues with a personal approach. Over the past 5 years, his work has turned into Environmental & Wildlife issues. Now he is working on various Tiger reserves in India, to documenting his longtime project of Human & Animal Conflict. He is also making documentary films on conservation.
He has won several awards from international organizations like POYi, Istanbul Photo Awards, National Geographic, WWF, Pano, Nature Image Awards, UNESCO, etc,.
In 2007, he won the "Geographical Photographer of the Year Award" from Royal Geographic Society, London.
He also received the "Hope Francoise Demulder Grant" from Angkor Photography Festival, Cambodia, 2014.
He have been Selected for World Press Photo Talent Program 6x6 Asia Region, 2019.
EXHIBITION & PROJECTIONS:
His works have been projected in Angkor Photo Festival, Delhi Photo Festival, Phnom Penh Festival, Obscura Festival, Odessa Photo Days & Suwon International Photo Festival. His works have also been exhibited in various galleries in China, London, France, USA, Singapore, Cambodia, Geneva & Malaysia.
PUBLISHED WORKS:
His photographs have been published in National Geographic, Getty Images, AFP, Terre Sauvage Magazine, Geographical, City Magazine, Photo Life Magazine, Outdoor Photography, India Today, Business Today, Open Magazine, Tehelka, Caravan, Traveller, Asian Photography & Better Photography.
Awards / Grants:
2003, Indian International Photographic Council, India. First Prize. Photo-Journalism.
2006, Humanity Photo Awards, UNESCO, China. Second Prize. Festivals.
2007, Geographical Photographer of the Year by Royal Geographical Society, London
2008, Connection Photo Contest, National Geographic Society, U.S.A. Honorable Mention.
2008, Climate Change Photo Contest, WWF, Honorable Mention. Environment.
2008, Image International Photo Contest, Canada. Runner Up. Travel.
2010, Epson Pano Awards, U.S.A. Third Prize
2011, Better Photography, Magic Cotton. First Prize
2011, IUCN, Melvita Nature Award, France. Winner. Wildlife Journalism
2012, Media Foundation of India, India. Winner. Sports
2012, IUCN, Melvita Nature Award, France. Winner. Wildlife Journalism
2014, Received "Hope Françoise Demulder Grant" from Angkor Photography Festival, Cambodia, 2014.
2016, (POYi) Picture of the Year International. Honorable Mention.
2017, Istanbul Photo contest, Istanbul. 3d prize. Nature .
2019, Hindu Photojournalism Award, Photo Story, First Prize.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Zubeni Lotha

  Photographer

×

Zubeni Lotha

Photographer

Zubeni Lotha is a photographer from the northeastern part of India in a state called Nagaland. She has published work in Outlook Traveller and The Caravan on the coal miners in the Jaintia Hills, Meghalaya. She has contributed to the New York Times India blog and the Random House blog post. She has also worked with the Nagaland Govt Honey-Beekeeping Resource Centre photographing the beekeeping tradition and methods in Nagaland. Her main focus of work is in Nagaland where she is looking to photograph Naga culture and society and works on questions of Identity, representations, culture and image making.

She has exhibited her work Dimapur797112 in Delhi in 2012. And has subsequently been exhibited at the M.F Hussain Gallery, Jami Millia Islamia University, Delhi and the Indian Institute for Human Settlement (IIHS) Bangalore as part of a group show and a panel discussion for the Urban Arc Conference on 19th Jan 2017. This work is about memories of her hometown Dimapur and is an ongoing project. Her work How Do I Look questions the idea of Naga culture, identity and representation. This work has been presented during the Hutton Lecture Kohima, Nagaland Dec 9th 2014 and at various universities and colleges in Nagaland And Meghalaya in 2015.

She received a grant for her project Looking at the Tree Again by the India Foundations for the Arts (IFA), which is looking into the history of photography practice in Nagaland by analyzing and critiquing the photographs of Christoph von furer-Haimendorf through her own photographs. This work was exhibitied in Delhi at the M.F Hussain Gallery, Jamilia Milia Islamia University (March 2017). It was also exhibited at the Assam State Museum, Gauhati (Dec 2017). She did a presentation of this work in Mumbai at the Tamaasha Theatre (28th Feb 2018). She is also a recipient of The Charles Wallace India Trust 2016 for her work on Landscape photography. She has also contributed her photographs for women artist collective book from the North East of India called Centrepiece published by Zubaan.She is currently a co-curator with the Humboldt Forum Kultur GmbH, Ethnology Museum working towards a Naga Exhibition in Berlin.

• 

  Tim Flach

  Photographer

×
Tim Flach
Photographer
Tim Flach is an animal photographer with an interest in the way humans shape animals and shape their meaning, exploring the role of imagery in fostering an emotional connection. Flach's fourth major body of work, titled Endangered, is a powerful visual record of animals that find themselves on the edge of extinction. He brings to life the complexity of the animal kingdom, his work ranging widely across species, united by a distinctive stylisation reflecting an interest in how we better connect people to the natural world. Our future may depend on it.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Amoghavarsha

  Photographer & Film maker

×
Amoghavarsha
Photographer & Film maker
An eye for capturing stories of the natural world and his deep roots in technology make Amoghavarsha a unique voice in telling stories of earth and its inhabitants. His latest film Wild Karnataka - India's very own blue chip natural history documentary narrated by Sir David Attenborough is set to release this fall. His work has been exhibited and appreciated across the world and won international awards. His work on climate change has not only been showcased in the United Nations Climate Change Conference (Paris) by Indian Prime Minister and French President but also at the UN general assembly (New York) amidst World leaders. He has been invited by various international forums to present his work on the use of media and technology in conservation including University of California (Los Angeles) and the Australian government. Amoghavarsha believes the greater journey for him is to build bridges using these portals between consciousness, thus fading the separation between humans and their fellow beings.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Saumya Khandelwal

  Photographer - National Geographic

×
Saumya Khandelwal
Photographer - National Geographic
Saumya Khandelwal is a photojournalist based in New Delhi, India, contributing for National Geographic and The New York Times among others. Having been selected for World Press Photo's 6X6 Global Talent Program 2019, she is a Getty Images Instagram Grantee 2017 for her work 'Child Brides of Shravasti' and has worked on gender and environment issues; having previously worked with Thomson Reuters and national daily Hindustan Times.
Over the past six years, Khandelwal has built a diverse body of work spanning journalism and documentary genres of photography that has been featured in The Guardian, The Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Al Jazeera and Time among others.
Recipient of the National Foundation of India Award 2017, Khandelwal's work has also been exhibited at Getty Images Gallery, London, India Photo Festival, Hyderabad, and Goa Photo Festival; and digitally exhibited at Women in Photography slideshow, Singapore.
Of late, she has contributed to The New York Times, National Geographic, Vanity Fair, Bloomberg Businessweek, MIT Tech Review, Daz Magazin, Nzz Am Sonntag, Rheinpfalz am Sonntag, Caravan, Scroll and IndiaSpend and NGOs Malala Fund and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.
When not wielding the lens, Khandelwal serves as a judge, mentor or speaker given the opportunity.
GRANTS, AWARDS & NOMINATIONS
2019 | Selected for World Press Photo 6X6 Global Talent Program
2019 | World Press Photo Joop Swart Nominee
2018 | World Press Photo Joop Swart Nominee
2017 | Getty Images Instagram Grant
2017 | National Foundation of India Award
2015 | Neel Dongre Photography Grant
2014 | Neel Dongre Photography Grant
EXHIBITIONS
2018 | 'Child Brides of Shravasti' exhibited at India Habitat Centre
2017 | Exhibited at Getty Images Gallery, London
2017 | 'Child Brides of Shravasti' exhibited at India Photography Festival
2016 | 'A Biography of Scrap' exhibited as a part of 'World of Recycle' at India Habitat Centre
2015 | 'Water - A dying lifeline' exhibited at Goa Photo Festival
2015 | 'Gurgaon' exhibited as part of 'Millennium Dreams' at India International Centre
TRAININGS AND TALKS
2018 | Speaker at TedxChennai on 'What photos can teach us about child brides'
2018 | Panelist at International Media Conference on 'Creative storytelling'
2018 | Participated in Hostile Environment Training by Key Objectives
2018 | Selected for New York Portfolio Review
2018 | Judge and mentor at Nikon's photo competition 'Through Her Lens'
2018 | Attended National Geographic Photo Seminar
2016 | East West Centre Alumni for Cross Border Reporting
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Zishaan A Latif

  Photographer

×
Zishaan A Latif
Photographer
An independent photographer since 2005. His work stems from intuition and passion which blends into the personal and sometimes eclectic. He work in many genres in the field. The art of making a photograph thrills him and thus releases him from preconceived notions of visual imagery or expectations from the various schools of thought.
He love working with different textures, formats and art forms, even using the art of motion picture in my creative pursuits. His work has been featured in both commercial and non-commercial collections, exhibitions and publications worldwide.
Professional Training / Workshops / Recognition :
- Prix Levallois Prize Finalist 2019.
- CatchLight Fellowship Finalist 2019.
- British Journal of Photography 'Ones to look out for' nominee 2019.
- India Habitat Centre Photosphere grant awardee 2018-19.
- Prix Pictet nominee 2016.
- Joop Swart Masterclass nominee 2015.
- Certificate of excellence at the Indian National Press Council Awards for Excellence in Journalism 2012.
- Foundry photography workshop (Istanbul) 2010.
- Angkor photography workshop (Siem Reap) 2009
Published :
Polka magazine, Narratively (NY), Bloomberg BusinessWeek, BusinessWeek, NY magazine, Private magazine (Italy), The Chronicle (Luxembourg), The Australian, The Sun (Australia), The Daily Telegraph (Australia), The Sunday Guardian (UK), The Times (UK), Wall Street Journal online (NY), SOS Children's Villages publications worldwide (during Nepal earthquake 2015), Caravan magazine, Agenda magazine, Better Photography, Deccan Herald, Hindustan Times HT Café, Mid- Day, Mumbai Mirror, Mumbai Boss online, OPEN magazine, PIX magazine, Platform Magazine, The Economic Times, The Hindu, The Hindustan Times, The Sunday Guardian (India), The Times of India, TimeOut magazine, Verve Online, Centre for Science and environment, Creative Image magazine.
Clientele :
UNICEF, UNDP, Uniqlo, Netflix, StudioRiley, Girls Count, Firefox cycles, Footprints, SOS Children's Villages (Int), Aamir Khan Productions, Asian Paints Pvt. Ltd, Aquarius Ad agency, Ambuja Cement Foundation, Brio Media, Canvas films, Deutsche Bank, FOX Int, Green Peace (India) , India Take One Productions, ISnetwork, Kriti productions, Marg publications, Micky Mehta's 360 degrees, Platform magazine, preservationsproject.com (Salima Tyabji), Raj kumar Hirani films, Sesame Street Workshop (India), Sir Dorabji Tata Trust (SDTT), Sofie Ahmed Art collection, Sula wines, www.thebigindianpicture.com, The Dance Academy (Shiamak Davar), The Scindia School, Think festival (Tehelka magazine), Vinod Chopra Films.
Photography :
Tutelage under Adeel Halim (Ex Reuters wire photographer in Mumbai) in 2005 and Mr. Rohinton Mehta, an Ex photography teacher at Xavier's Institute of Communication (XIC, Mumbai and photo editor of Smart Photography magazine) in 2005-06.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Gopal MS

  Photographer & Blogger

×
Gopal MS
Photographer & Blogger
I am a blogger who has been documenting the streets of Mumbai for 10 years at Mumbaipaused.com. I am an advertising copywriter who shoots on my way to work and I shoot daily life on the streets. I like to observe and document changes in a city that is constantly transforming. I also make digital photobooks that tell stories from urban India.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Harikrishna Katragadda

  Photographer

×
Harikrishna Katragadda
Photographer
Harikrishna Katragadda is a Mumbai based photographer whose work explores communities, environment and personal memories. After graduating with an engineering degree from Indian Institute of Technology Madras, he taught himself photography and began to document the protest movement against the construction of Sardar Sarovar Dam on Narmada river. He then went on to graduate with a Masters degree in photojournalism from the University of Texas at Austin. After assisting photographers in New York, he moved to New Delhi to start his career as a photojournalist with Mint newspaper. He has published and exhibited internationally and is the recipient of the Media Foundation for India prize and the National Foundation for India fellowship. Since 2010 he has been working as an independent photographer working on issues of environment with non-profit organizations like Greenpeace, UNICEF and UNDP.
Using long-term documentary approach, he also works with alternative photographic methods to incorporate found materials in images. His work on the pollution in the Ganges using Cyanotypes was awarded the India Habitat Centre Photosphere Grant and the 2018 Invisible Photographer Asia Art award.
Most recently, taking inspiration from contemporary visual art he collaborated with his partner to create a photobook using fragments from their diaries, literature and cinema, which was the finalist for the 2019 Hypercosmos edition PDF award.
• Instagram

• 

  Rafique Sayed

  Fine Art Photographer

×
Rafique Sayed
Fine Art Photographer
When he was a child, he was only interested in cricket. Pictures never attracted him, ads held no meaning. Photographers were a non-entity, and models were never more beautiful than his English teacher.
Times change.
He came into professional photography more by chance than choice. To excel became a matter of pride, and he chose fashion as my field of specialisation, which brought with it name, fame, arrogance and a narrow vision.
Beauty came to be defined as a perfect physical entity, not more, not less. Photography was : turning people into beautiful, babydoll images, expressionless, but beautiful. Lines of character - which, according to Audrey Hepburn, are lines of knowledge - started vanishing; if not by makeup and lighting, then, by the simple stroke of a mouse.
After ten to twelve years, it all seems like history. For he awoke one morning, and unlike the great Dali who used to think what the great man would do that morning, he found that I had nothing to do. He had an almost empty canvas before him, with very few pictures of fashion and beauty in one corner... the rest was as naked as truth.
In the words of Kahlil Gibran, "How mean am I when life gives me gold and I give you silver, and yet I deem myself generous."
He tried to discard the tag of fashion photographer, and for a change, shot portraits of real people, nature, still life, even cars and hotels. The more he put on my plate, the more hungry he became
His canvas is still empty. He need people to help him fill it up with creative, meaningful and out of the ordinary work. He want to give gold for gold.
• Instagram
• Website

• 

  Arko Datto

  Photographer

×

Arko Datto

Photographer

Arko's aim with photography is to question what it means to be a photographer in the digital age while simultaneously playing the role of observer and commentator on critical issues. He pursue narratives on seemingly disparate topics- forced migration, techno-fascism, surveillance in the digital panopticon, disappearing islands, nocturnal realms and psychosomatic stress of captive animals to name a few. Although every narrative he explore is separate and different from the next, together they form threads of inquiry into the existential dilemmas of our times.

By incorporating and developing diverse visual languages and styles, he want to push the boundaries of both still and moving images. He was on his way to a doctorate in theoretical sciences before he decided to change course. He also enjoy teaching and curating the works of others.

He is currently represented by East Wing Gallery, Dubai.