Lining up the `moments'
SANGEETA BAROOAH PISHAROTY
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Come August 19, People for Animals will bring as many as 200 photographers from across the country on a single platform in New Delhi.
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PICTURE PERFECT: Maneka Gandhi with a few photographs to be exhibited in the upcoming show The Incredible Moment. PHOTO: SHANKER CHAKRAVARTY.
Her tone and the tenor are of attainment. Almost.
For the funds raised from the venture would soon bring to reality the 19th hospital of her organisation, People For Animals. Way off in Kerala's Thiruvananthapuram.
But the medium Maneka Gandhi chose to grasp her goal is in itself worth taking a note. As many as 200 photographers from different pockets of the country would assemble between August 19 and 21 under the banner of `The Incredible Moment' in New Delhi. To exhibit and sell 10 each of their "best works" thus running up the number of photographs to be displayed for sale to 2000.
Says Maneka, "After the idea came up, it took us about four months to collect so many photographers. Besides Mumbai and Delhi, we have participants from even small places like Tethal in Gujarat etc." Happy that while PFA would get yet another animal hospital, it would provide a single, but wide enough, platform for many a little-known photographer.
"We tried to look at the works of the photographers rather than their names. Initially, we accepted what the photographers thought are their best works but gradually, we did a bit of choosing of pictures. The pictures are a mix of everything. Each participant has a different theme or lack of one but all can come under the single umbrella of the show's theme, `The Incredible Moment'," explains the Member of Parliament.
Sitting at her Ashoka Road residence strewn with the short-listed pictures for the exhibition-cum-sale to be displayed at Maurya Sheraton, Maneka says, "Already, we have raised funds worth Rs.60 lakhs from the photographs."
The big and the bigger
And with names like Raghu Rai, Dayanita Singh, Gautam Rajdhyaksha, Prabuddha Dasgupta and S. Paul, etc featuring in the list besides many young promising photographers like Parthiv Shah, Kriti Arora, Arko Datta, Saadiya Kochar, Anita Khemka and Anita Dube, etc, even media camerapersons like Saibal Das, Renuka Puri, Mustafa Querishi and more, she is hopeful of collecting much more for the cause of animal care.
"We even have many students in this exhibition. We didn't say no to anyone. We asked them to show their work to us and on finding them so good, we asked them to be a part of the show," adds Kriti Arora, who has worked with Maneka in the venture.
"Finally, the benchmark is, they all have to be collectibles. And I would like to stress here that they all are of museum quality," sums up Maneka. Sealed with that familiar smile.
The exhibition will remain open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
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