1. What is your earliest memory of how or what attracted you to photography?
The stories of my family members in Dubai – struggling as migrant workers and wanting to tell their stories and showing them to relatives back in India is what got me interested in photography.
2. What made you shift from your medical practice to an art practice?
Throughout my school days, I’d win awards in art competitions and excel in all my art exams, but none of it was taken seriously, as art then was supposed to be a hobby, not a career. My parents still haven’t come around to the fact that I am an artist and have given up my career as a medical professional.
Apart from that, I had a camera from a very young age and I’ve always wanted to take photographs. I made a trip to the northeast back in 2008, and went around documenting the lives of the different people I came across. That’s how photography began for me.
Photography started to seem like a very interesting medium for me to start with. I used to paint and sketch at home, but I didn’t think the results were good enough. However, photography came to me quite easily. There was no real hesitation or thought process behind it. I knew almost instinctively that medicine wasn’t my thing and the shift thereafter happened very quickly.
3. Do you have any formal education in the arts / photography?
No
4. Do you think it is important to have such an education in order to have a successful career as an artist / photo artist?
I think this is a very subjective question. I taught myself, but if there were right places to learn, I perhaps would have benefitted from the same. A base in general aesthetics is important to have – be it from home schooling or even a college education. I am not rigid about a formal education.
5. If you were to design a photography program for young Indian photographers, what would it look like? Would it be a degree course? Workshop format? Mentorships?
I feel the right mentorship is very much needed. Someone from whom you can get constant critiques. One-on-one sessions with a mentor really help.
6. When you started photography, was it with the analog or the digital? Which medium do you prefer using?
When I started out, it was only analog as the digital era had not taken over. I still prefer to use analog any given day.
7. What tends to draw you to work on a certain idea?
I usually work on things and issues that stir something within me and make me want to talk about them. Once the trigger happens, I read and research about the same, and then think of ways to talk about the same.
8. While working on projects, do they typically run in parallel or do you focus on one project at a time?
I don’t have a particular format for working. I usually finish one and then start another, though sometimes the projects are never over as well. I do have a mood board-idea book where I write down or draw my thoughts and see how to go about each of them.
9. When you put together a series of images, please share your process while you are creating the narrative of the story.
I look at it from how I understood the story and hence lay them out. If I am working on a photo story, then I always print the images and then physically lay them out to see how they make sense together.
10. Can you share a bit about some of your personal photographic work / projects? Why do you make a particular body of work? What guides you and influences your photographic work at large?
I make work when I feel the need to talk about something that causes restlessness within me. I sometimes realize later that it connects to a larger, widespread problem. For instance, my project Vincent Uncle relates to child sex abuse, which is quite a widespread issue that is seldom discussed because of the taboo associated with it.
11. Your practice is a mix of photography, video, installation and performance, and you say that “photography is your first medium and came to you naturally.” How and why did you progress to include other art forms with your photography? How naturally do all these intersect in your various projects?
Working in just one medium made me feel confined and claustrophobic. Also, the idea of the context being more important than the medium helped me open up to various media. By the way, I stitch a lot these days.
12. Digital technology has changed photography drastically over the last few years. Did you initially embrace the changes or resist them? Do you believe the changes have been good for the medium or not?
I think I have always resisted this change. I guess it’s a lot to do with the way I function. I take photos at a slow pace and have never been trigger happy; so, analog fits well with my character. I have used digital media, as well. But, like I said, I prefer analog as it allows for the creation of work with your hands in a slow manner.
13. Who or what has inspired you to pursue your art practice of photography, video, installation, and performance art?
Many things inspire me. I go around the local markets a lot and to katteys, which basically are spaces where people get together to have all kinds of conversations. I like to just sit there and hear peoples’ stories. As an artist, it’s very easy to get sucked into your bubble, so it’s nice to be grounded. People and their stories are my biggest inspiration. Every time I see something new, I try to think about what it is or about the people behind it. Of course, going to new films and exhibitions, seeing other artists’ works and how they connect to their surroundings, are also very inspiring.
14. Is there a book, an exhibition, or a body of work that has really impressed you and maybe even influenced your work / life?
A visit to the Hamburger Bahnhof Museum in Berlin in the summer of 2017 to see the show Capital: Debt – Territor – Utopia changed a lot of my perception and inspired me. I am also constantly inspired on an everyday basis. I guess I am easily impressed.
15. Do you ever find yourself creatively ‘stuck?’ Is there something that is particularly helpful to you in overcoming this?
I often get stuck! Physical exercise, reading, or a change of scene helps me get over it. I put myself in surprising situations to see how I react and it mostly breaks my bubble.
16. How do you measure success or that a body of work is going well?
For me, I guess it is about an internal feeling of having done my best.
17. How much effort do you put into getting your work shown? Is this important to you? Does showing your work feed your creative process or does it distract from it?
For me, it is important to show the work as it brings about another layer of understanding my own work. I do not always make work in the confines of my studio. It is made with a lot of people involved and showcasing it is its own sense of exploration.
18. Do you feel that there are adequate opportunities and avenues to share / show your work in India, or do you always look for such opportunities abroad?
There are avenues here in India, however there are definitely more opportunities in certain other countries. For instance, it is much easier to show work in a place like Berlin.
19. Do you think there is a universal language that photography uses? Are Indian photographers finding that they are judged by western criteria and standards?
I do not think there is any uniformity in photography other than the term itself. At a recent portfolio review in the U.S., I was informed that if they do conduct an exhibition on the theme of India, they would include my work. I find this stereotyping restrictive.
20. How would an interested collector go about buying your work?
The collector can directly contact me, we can have a drink and discuss accordingly.
21. You are the recipient of the FICA Public Art Grant 2018 for your project entitled Cecilia’ed. Please share a bit about this project.
Cecilia’ed looks at disrupting normative notions of gender in public spaces by working with neighbourhood spaces that are marked ‘unsafe’ for women, using the politics of the herd mentality and celebrity culture. Taking Bangalore as the locus of the project, I have identified obsolete spaces, like salons and bars – gendered spaces, specifically – and intend to reopen them through a ceremonial show using Cecilia, who is a local figure of emancipation and bravura. The project shall generate and make use of processes like old lithograph posters, sonic cartographs and photo albums of the events in an attempt to preserve an analogue visual language, and map the gendered predicaments and histories of the pockets being reopened.
22. With your years of experience, of the lessons you have learned, what is the one thing you wish someone had told you when you were starting out?
Nothing. I have learnt everything on the go. I don’t think I would have listened to anybody.
23. If you didn’t do photography / art, what is the next best thing you would like to be doing?
Dance, I think.
Copyright © 2021, PhotoSouthAsia. All Rights Reserved.
Copyright © Avinandan Sthanpati
20 November
