Janice Savina Rodrigues |NT BUZZ
What happens when three friends who have been associated with art and media for over two decades get their heads together and want to get more friends down to Goa? They whip up an exhibition! Celebrity hairstylist Adhuna Bhabani, and gallerist and art advisor for the Hamburg-based arts collective DerbeLight Illuminated art, Deepti Datt have joined hands and persuaded fashion photographer Rafique Sayed to exhibit some of his work here in Goa. The exhibition titled ‘As I see it’ is an exclusive peek into the work of a famed photographer with over three decades of experience, who has quiet surprisingly never exhibited before.
Housed in the Harmony Villas in the quaint green village of Assagao, the exhibition adorns the walls of the various rooms of one villa. Adhuna Bhabani, a very senior hairstylist in the Indian fashion scene has brought some of Rafique Sayed’s works to be shown here, “Rafique and I have shared a very deep friendship; he gave me my first break when I moved to India as a hairstylist. We’ve worked together for many years, it’s just that he happens to have this body of amazing work but he’s never exhibited any of it. We managed to persuade him to exhibit here in Goa because he’s also got a strong connection and family here. I love Rafique’s style of work,” says Adhuna.
The curator of the exhibition, Deepti backed with more than twenty five years of experience in working with art, has an online gallery called Axirvaad, where she represents various artists. “Axirvaad is also a part of the DerbeLight collective – an art collective where we also make light installations with German technology, and have some of the world’s best photographers on board. Well known photographers including Andrea Piotto, Italy; Andy Yeung, Hong Kong; Asako Shimizu, Japan; Dorothee Urbaum, Munich; Gabriela Medina, Paris; Johnny Miller, South Africa; Mira Visuals, Amsterdam, and Rafique from India, they are represented globally by us,” says Deepti who has also worked in the art department of several films, national and international.
The current exhibition is online as well, but the artistic duo decided to bring it to the real world to enable people of Goa to see the work of the photographer. “We are always cooking up excuses to bring people to Goa,” laughs Deepti, asserting that she wants to open the idea of a sustainable way of exhibiting artworks as well. Adhuna adds: “The whole project is aimed at being sustainable. The frames are made from upcycled wood, while the photography is Rafique’s black-and-white work.”
The portraits have a sense of awe around them, a rather dreamy quality. Speaking about the displayed work Adhuna says: “In the wonderful world of advertising, we have had to adapt, and Rafique has done work in various hues and shades. On a personal level, black-and-white is the medium he prefers and his pictures come to fore in a very dark, dramatic way. They are very real I think.” As the viewer moves from room to room the collection comes across as sub-collections and the work is something that is quite opposite of fashion photography. “When you’re working with fashion you have these specific things you have to look out for and focus on, but here he’s kind of inverted it all, there are no boundaries and the photographs are very open and magical, almost allegorical,” says Deepti.
The duo point out to picture of the Ladakh landscape as their favourite. “We’ve worked together mostly in fashion, so when I saw the photograph of the landscape I was wowed. It was almost a portrait of the landscape,” adds Adhuna. The picture of the landscape has also been converted into a light installation, a specialty of the DerbeLight collective. “All we needed for the light installation here is a 2.6 centimetres deep niche and a plug point. The installation has a regulator so the viewer can adjust the luminosity and tonality, so he is also a part of the installation, it then becomes ‘as he sees it’,” says Deepti.
Adding to the uniqueness of the exhibition is the fact that these portraits are for sale, albeit on the online gallery, and they are only available in one print. “Rafique is selling his prints but only one print per image so that his work becomes a piece of art. The frames are made from upcycled wood, are as basic as they can get and devoid varnish, thus keeping up to the uniqueness of the art and the sustainable aspect,” says Deepti.
Ask them why Rafique had not exhibited until now, Adhuna replies quickly, “Rafique is somebody who believes in the adage ‘let the work speak for itself’ and his work does that. He has never felt the need to go out and exhibit his works. This exhibition is our initiative, we had this space and Deepti has worked with art and we wanted to have art around us. So we thought why not have it here?”
Deepti adds that creative people do have a soft corner for Goa. “Our makeup artists, producers, designers, writers have a soft spot for Goa, and that cross pollination can be very enriching and we wanted to bring that here. There is a lot of flux in Goa and the place is evolving and we want to be part of the movement,” she concludes.
(The exhibition ‘As I see it’ will be open to viewing at the Axirvaad Spice Villa, Harmony Villas, Assagao from today.)