As part of my internship with Karadi Tales in 2018, I was put on a one-of-a-kind assignment to photograph a city - something I had never done before. The brief was to follow the trail of letters written by Aftab Yusuf Shaikh about a girl who has lost her mother and goes back years later to her hometown, Delhi.
She visits places in an attempt to reconnect with her mother.
The book was to become an amalgamation of
photographs, words and illustration.
I followed this trail of letters for three days in Delhi to photograph the locations. This resulted in getting to discover the city in ways I could never have done otherwise - travelling solo around the massive old city, commuting at rush hour in the Delhi metro trains (Rajiv Chowk included), walking down the thin lanes of old Dilli to find Mirza Ghalib's home or finding vantage points from the minarets of Jama Masjid to get a glimpse of the colourful world of Chandi Chowk.
She visits places in an attempt to reconnect with her mother.
The book was to become an amalgamation of
photographs, words and illustration.
I followed this trail of letters for three days in Delhi to photograph the locations. This resulted in getting to discover the city in ways I could never have done otherwise - travelling solo around the massive old city, commuting at rush hour in the Delhi metro trains (Rajiv Chowk included), walking down the thin lanes of old Dilli to find Mirza Ghalib's home or finding vantage points from the minarets of Jama Masjid to get a glimpse of the colourful world of Chandi Chowk.
Once back in the KT studio in Chennai with the raw photographs, I set down to arrange them in the book along with the words and the illustrations. Slowly over the next consecutive months, the book started taking some shape. With constant guidance and feedback from Shobha Viswanath (publishing director of Karadi Tales), the book was finally published in May 2019 as part of "The City Series".
The book was nominated in
Neev Literature Festival 2020 as part of the "Emerging Reader" category.
Neev Literature Festival 2020 as part of the "Emerging Reader" category.
title page illustration done by me.
