When the national lockdown to battle Covid-19 was announced, I was pursuing my photography diploma in Delhi. I wouldn’t complain about the extent to which the pandemic derailed my life, because I am aware of most other people having it far worse for themselves.
On the contrary, my privilege enabled me to sit amidst the cozy confines of my ancestral home in Khimsar for most of the summer. Unlike my fellow students, who jostled for creative assignment submissions in limited urban setups, I worked around my fashion photography module with a plethora of picturesque locations and sporting family members that made for highly suave models. In hindsight, my photographic knowhow seems to have documented only a tiny fragment of their full potential. That said, this rare circumstantial opportunity formed a turning point for me.
With a grateful heart, I proudly present my humble collection of lockdown portraits that I directed and executed under the guidance of my mentor, Arpit Tyagi. The overriding theme across this body of work is a tribute to Shakti— the feminine energy that resides within each one of us. A vital source of our in- tuition, empathy, strength and resilience, the feminine energy finds traditional resemblances to the Earth as the sole provider of life.
The current pandemic has provided a juncture of intense existentialist questioning for humankind over the role we play as terrestrial beings. Our skewed equation with our ecosphere has been rightly perceived by many as a deliberate flaw that precedes us. Whether or not it will outlive us is a question that leaves itself open to individual and communal choice.
These musings have since long dominated my sensibility and hence, I discerned the need to artistically document the feminine energy through a series of portraits. I consider it to be my personal bid to my viewership to re- examine a fundamental part of their spiritual mechanism and channelise that towards healing and nurturing the very source of their existence.
The author is a writer, blogger and Editor-in-Chief of Rajputana Collective.