New Delhi, 1st of August 2019
An evening was hosted by Ayesha Kapoor to Launch THE DISCERNING EYE – 16 Conversations of the leading Indian Contemporary photographers.
They are diverse photographers from fashion and art field, where in a 17 year old has worked on and researched on for one year as her project. Ayesha is herself also an avid photographer.
The names of the photographer whom she has featured in her book are -Raghu Rai, Gigi Scaria, Sanjay Bhattacharyya, Parul sharma , Ajay Rajgarhia Vivek Vilasini, Tarun Khiwal, JJ Valaya, Karan Khanna, Surekha,Ram Shergill Waswo X. Waswo, Naveen Kishore, Ravi Aggarwal, Riddhi Brata Burman, and Prarthana Modi.
Ayesha Kapoor was brought up in a family of art collectors. So it is not surprising that she chose to strike out on her own by choosing the interviews of sixteen photographers as an avenue to express her creative feelings through.
What she chose to highlight were those special photographic moments in which light and shade, an environment, an individual negotiating a path through them and the interlocution of the interviewer herself, come together to give us a narrative that revolves around life observed, savoured and shared from many different angles, creating unique vignettes of moments in time. Each response in itself is complete. But put together a narrative emerges that is completely different from each of the interviews. That Ayesha has chosen to use this framework for her first analysis of the world of photographers strikes one as a very difficult task to undertake. But the ease with which she has achieved this is creditable for a young photographer with a mission.
The book is a beginning, but one that is put together with the perception of one steeped in the experience of art and the capacity and confidence to ensure that she gets the best in the field to participate in her project. This sincerity of purpose, capacity to string together different elements and the confidence of approaching the best in the field is something creditable that she has carried off with success.
About Ayesha Kapoor
Ayesha Kapoor is a 17 year old student of Modern School, Vasant Vihar, New Delhi. She has represented her school in several competitions in India. This journal took her one year to compile. She has interned in the research department of leading newspaper Patriot in New Delhi and in the cataloguing department in Saffron Art Auction House, New Delhi. She has used her experience gained there for this journal. She is in the photography department and in the editorial board of the School. She is also a painter and avid photographer.