Collaborative narrative : a creative experiment in photography exhibition

The Ravishankar Raval Lalit Kala Academy hosted “Narratives: Short Stories from street and wild: A photography exhibition”  from the 2^nd to the 4^th of December.  The exhibition was sponsored by the State Lalit Kala Academy.

The exhibition showcases the photo journey of Dr. Puneet Aggarwal and Payal Patel. The two chose to collaborate and come together to showcase their works, although distinct the show beautifully synergizes their work to create a compelling narrative. Mr. Aggarwal finds his subjects on the street while Ms. Patel a nature lover finds hers in a wilderness.

Mr. Aggarwal is a faculty of Medicine at NHL Medical College in Ahmedabad. Photography started as a hobby and grew into a passion for him. He has received the 51^st state Lalit Kala Academy Scholarship in 2011 and has previously exhibited his work “Faith” at Kanoria Centre for the Arts in 2012. Besides medicine and photography, Dr. Aggarwal also writes and is a published author.

For him his photographs are beyond the visible imagery, they speak about his experiences and philosophies. He considers himself a people photographer and captures people and meaning in his photographs.Dr. Aggarwal’s photographs are life sketches that border between surrealism and realism. His collection is divided in color and monochrome, each set evocative in its own way.

The first photo story is on relationships and beautifully captures the emotions and expressions on people’s faces.  The second story is about religion and shows symbols associated with different religions and peoples association with them.  The third story looks at the intricacies and burdens of life and is shot in somber black and white. The fourth story shows life above and below water.

The photographs have been captured all over the country from Kashmir to the southern parts of India. All the stories expertly capture different facets of human life and emotion as well as the landscape that we create around us and our interaction with it.

Ms. Patel is a faculty of Biochemistry at Baroda Medical College. She is passionate about photography and has traveled extensively across the world. She prefers to travel to places which take her close to nature so that she can explore the flora, fauna and ecosystem of the place.

She started her photographic journey 3 years ago, in her photographs, she explores the natural world.

Her stories capture different aspects of the natural world. The first looks at habitats of different species, how different species thrive in varying landscapes. These may sometimes seem hostile to some onlookers but each species has uniquely adapted to these conditions.  The second story shows how animals mark their territory with images of a ferocious tiger. The third, fourth and fifth stories show the behavior of different animal species like mating, feeding and protecting their habitat.

The next story shows the natural and abnormal perch of the animals; it shows how with the encroachment of humans on the natural world, animals are losing their habitats and finding ways and means of surviving. It is a poignant story, beautifully captured.

Ms. Patel has captured these images all over the country and abroad, these include places like Ranthambore, Gandhinagar, Kashmir, Dang, Rajasthan and Bhutan.

The artists have curated and exhibited some excellent images in the exhibition. We at CY hope that they continue doing so and showcase more of their work in the future!

Photographs : Trusha Trivedi