One of my photographs was shortlisted as a nominee in the landscape category of Better Photography's Photographer of the Year contest. Unfortunately, I didn't end up winning, but it feels good to be nominated at least :-). 
Here is a link where you can see the nominees and winning photographs - betterphotography.in/2012/01/31/poy-2011-nominees/

This is the photograph which made it to the nominee list.

While growing up in the seventies in India, Kashmir was the only hill station that one knew of, & this beautiful state was showcased to the hilt in the romantic movies of Shammi and Shashi Kapoor. Kashmir was engraved in all our minds forever as a heaven on earth thanks to the immortal lines uttered by Jehangir - " Gar firdaus bar rue zameen ast, hameen asto, hameen asto, hameen ast" translated as "If ever there is paradise on earth, it is here, it is here, it is here!". After almost twenty years of trouble, Kashmir has seen a rare summer of peace this year. We were lucky enough to be able to take advantage of this, and paid a short visit to Srinagar last week. It is the fall season there now, and the entire state is currently a riot of colours. From a pre-dawn shikara ride to see the floating market, to plucking luscious apples from orchards to horse rides in the lovely meadows of Pahalgam, we tried to squeeze in as much of the state as we could in the three brief days of our stay there. And the state totally lived up to its reputation. Lovely weather, beautiful landscapes, friendly and beautiful people - Kashmir is all this and more. I hope that Kashmir remains peaceful from now on so that the people can prosper after so many years of strife. And of course, I do hope that we will be able to go back to visit this beautiful pace time and again. Hope you like the photos of Kashmir that I have loaded on this site. Look forward to your feedback.

Some more good news. Four of my photographs have been selected and are currently being exhibited in the Russian Centre of Science and Culture up to 21st October. This exhibition is to showcase photographs of " twin cities" of India and Russia, i.e. Delhi and Moscow, Mumbai and St. Petersburg, and Chennai and Volgograd. Here is the official exhibition poster, followed by my images that are being displayed. Hope you like them.

Our exhibition got written about in the Hindu. Here is the article.
Thinking out of the boxSHARE  ·   PRINT   ·   T+  Works by Anidra Hom ChaudhuriAn artist, often quite unwittingly, is the conscience keeper of a society. He fathoms depths that his peers cannot even begin to dive into, his passion sparked off with the slightest stimulation. Burdened as he is by the emotional depth inherent in his nature, he manifests that what he perceives through his art. As Michelangelo said, a man (read artist) paints with his brains and not with his hands.

A photography exhibition soon to be unveiled in New Delhi drives home just this point. Titled “From Infinitesimal to the Infinite”, this exhibition features the works of Delhi-based photographers Anidra Hom Chaudhuri, Jishnu Changkakoti and Prerna Jain. Through this exhibition, the trio aims to explore life from diminutive dimensions to transcendental terrains and into interminable expanses. Proceeds from the sale of the photographs will go to Sarthak Prayas, an NGO working in sectors such as education, health and welfare of senior citizens in the National Capital Region.

The exhibition, which will be up from August 23-25 at the Convention Centre Foyer at India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, was conceived with the aim of exploring “divergent paths of photography”. So, while Prerna introduces us to artistic abstraction, Jishnu explores life through panoramic vistas and landscapes. Anidra, adding the third dimension, attempts to “document the way people live their lives,” capturing life as it happens. “So, we journey from the micro to the vast and into the third dimension, going beyond everyday life into the realm of the ethereal,” says Jishnu.

The three are very different in their approach to art, just as they are in different professions. Prerna, married for 35 years, is a painter, sculptor, photographer and avid blogger — one of the first bloggers in India, hooked right at the onset. Anidra, originally from Silchur, Assam, is a journalist, while Jishnu works as a manager with a U.S.-based company.

Prerna ‘discovered' photography two years ago. A “natural artist” as her friends like to call her, she finds her penchant in abstract photography, especially floral abstract. Colours, shapes and depth have a special attraction for her. Most of her work is an exploration of beauty with detailed or macro photography. “Too many things in the frame confuse me. With macro I can focus my attention on the details and explore.”

“With painting you have to be patient whereas with photography you are rewarded with instant gratification,” says this mother of two girls doing their Masters.

For Anidra, what started out as toying around a simple point and shoot camera (his father's Rangefinder was strictly out of bounds), blossomed into a life-long passion. His genre, he says, is photo documentary, where he documents people and places because “there is a possibility that these beautiful things may not be there tomorrow.” Though his renditions are usually black and white, his love for vibrant colours and energy has taken him to many fairs and festivals, which quite predictably are his favourite background. He has done a series on fairs and festivals such as Holi in Mathura, Aarti in Varanasi, Hola Mahala in Punjab and now wants to work on the Baul singers, jatras and jallikattu. “We as photographers are dependent on the society, and photography, in addition to giving me an expression, gives me a chance to give back to the society,” he says. A true photographer, according to him, is one who can “click photographs without using the camera. When you start seeing frames all around you — that is when the photographer in you has really come of age.”

Jishnu, meanwhile, is an avid traveller, and being with a company that gives him a chance to travel frequently, he has no complaints.

Growing up in Shillong hills nurtured a life-long fascination for nature and through his years of travelling he explored nature and landscape through photography. This engineering and management graduate did a short-term correspondence course in photography while in the U.S. and then trained with Delhi-based Munish Khanna, where he met Prerna and Anidra.

Having successfully participated in exhibitions in Delhi in the past, for Jishnu the most important element of art is the onlooker. “When people walk into a gallery, they should see your work and appreciate it. Being pedantic about the technique alone does not help. An onlooker, an ordinary person, must appreciate the composition at the very basic level.”

On their collaboration with Sarthak Prayas, he says, “Since all three of us do not rely on art for a living, we try and help people through our art.” The photographs, priced between Rs.8000 and 18000, will also be put up for sale at a virtual gallery on the NGO's website (www.sarthakprayas.org) for donors to buy from there.

Here is the official poster for our next exhibition starting day-after-tomorrow. For those of you who live in Delhi, please drop in if possible. Thanks.

I am very happy to announce that along with two of my fellow photographers, I have got the opportunity to have an exhibition of my work.  Each of us will put up 10-12 photographs. What is exciting is that I will finally get a chance to display a large canvas print. Ever since I saw the canvas prints that my teacher Munish Khanna had displayed during his last exhibition, I've been itching for a chance to do the same. And luckily, the chance has come much earlier than expected!
Even better, we are using this exhibition to raise funds for a very deserving charity NGO Sarthak Prayas(www.sarthakprayas.org). This NGO is doing very good work in a number of areas, & I am hoping that the response to the exhibition is good so that we are able to generate sufficient funds for them. For people who may not be able to attend the exhibition, we are planning to host a virtual gallery of our exhibited images on Sarthak Prayas's facebook page so that interested people can buy the prints online too.

The official press release of the exhibition is given below.


A joint fine art photography exhibition “ From Infinitesimal To The Infinite” by Anidra Hom Chaudhuri, Jishnu Changkakoti and Prerna Jain will open on 23, 24 and 25 of Aug at the Convention Centre Foyer at India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road, New Delhi - 110003. In this exhibition, the work of three artists who explore divergent paths of photography is on display.

Be introduced to the myriad colours and shapes of the infinitesimal through Prerna's macro and abstract photography, journey through the hues and colours of human life through Anidra’s work, and marvel at the beauty of infinitely large vistas of the earth captured in Jishnu 's photographs .

These photographers, who are part of the Delhi based World Photography Partners, have earlier been a part of different successful exhibitions at the Habitat Centre and Alliance Francaise De Delhi.  All profits from this exhibition will go to support Sarthak Prayas, an NGO working for Voluntary Blood Donation Promotion, HIV/AIDS, Thallassemia, Children Education and Senior Citizens Welfare (www.sarthakprayas.org)
Photographers  exhibiting-
Anidra Hom Chaudhuri- www.flickr.com/photos/anidrahomchaudhuri/
Jishnu Changkakoti- www.jischang.com
Prerna Jain-  http://prernasphotographs.com/

While Ladakh has obviously been a mind-blowing trip, the amazing thing is that it still has not succeeded in wiping away the memories of another place that we visited a year ago. This place is in a way the diametric opposite of Ladakh. While the vast vistas of Ladakh numb the viewer with their majesty and beauty, Munsyari's charms creep up on you almost without you realizing it. Munsyari is a very small town in the northernmost reaches of Uttarakhand. It is practically the last outpost before the Tibet border. Till the fifties, before China decided that Tibet was its property, Munsyari was an important stop-over on a trade route between India and Tibet. Of all things, salt was a highly valued commodity that was traded along this route! 
Alpine meadows, gurgling and gushing streams, snow-clad mountain peaks - Munsyari has all this and more. We spent 3 lovely days here exploring the charms of this beautiful location. Thanks to its relative inaccessibility (600+ km from Delhi over a road that seems proud to show off its collection of boulders, streams and mud to motorists, Munsyari is another of those rare places that has not yet been crassly commercialized. 
Check out some photographs of Munsyari on my flickr account at http://www.flickr.com/photos/jischang/sets/72157622509319899/. 
And to really enjoy the flavour of our trip with some beautiful descriptions of Munsyari as well as the other places we visited, here is a travelogue by my friend Joydeep, with whose family we had made this trip.

Here is Joydeep's write-up on our Ladakh trip.