Fashionable fakirs
Rohit Chawla is a name that evokes a sense of style, gloss, grandeur and everything that you associate with the world of glamour. But he has moved on. The ace photographer for some years now is working for his passion. So he takes off to Kutch to shoot Rabaris, the nomads of Rajasthan, or he takes to reinterpreting Raja Ravi Varma and Gustav Klimt. The impeccable styling and gloss minus the grandeur and his love for design and form shine in his latest exhibition “Goa Style”.
“I wanted to do simple images with strong graphic sensibilities. I didn’t want any distractions of background. I wanted the people. Doing anything else would have taken away from the purity of the image. I believe in the minimal. If you look at all my works, there is a strong sense of graphic and design,” says Rohit.
Talking about his muse of the current series, Rohit says, “They (the subjects of the current exhibition) are from East Ireland, Sweden, Israel etc. This is an incredibly creative community… these global nomads have a hippie lifestyle with a natural sense of style. All the clothes you see them wearing are ones they have created. So I captured these nomads who come to Goa every year where they spend four months every season.”
He adds, “The work, the styling, the clothes of these nomads is so grunge, so bohemian that this exhibition also needed to be mounted in a subversive way. I have tried to mount it in different materials possible… there’s wallpaper, gold foil, steel, vinyl, wood and leather. All these pictures are done on HP printer.”
Sharing the details of his roots in the field of advertising, Rohit says, “A photographer can’t be just happy about documenting something that already exists. Advertising is a very ruthless profession, if you are mediocre it will throw you out. My background gives me that gloss and technique which helps me in creating this kind of work. But now I have moved away consciously. Advertising is young people’s business. This is my way of rediscovering my soul.”
Fashion designer Tarun Tahiliani, who is hosting the exhibition, says, “Goa has always fascinated me since childhood. It has got this mix of Portuguese, Hindu and world influences. These images have a style and a language of their own that exudes highly aesthetic and fashionable vibes.”
On display at Religare Art Gallery till March 20, 11 am to 6.30 pm
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