stars waiting for main lights to come on (set of "rok sako to rok lo")
rafil kroll-zaidi
born: New Delhi, India
Currently resides in New York, New York
work statement
In 2003–2004, I undertook a photo essay on the Bollywood film industry, seeking to create images that would be enlivened by the color and iconography of mainstream Indian cinema and whose framing, juxtapositions, and lighting would remove the actors and sets from their contexts and suggest narratives drastically different from those of the films themselves. At the same time, I conducted an intensive large-format study of Bombay landscapes; these images, by evoking a specifically cinematic sense of drama in the city itself, resonate with and enrich the Bollywood material.
bio
Rafil Kroll-Zaidi was born in India and raised in that country and in Texas. He was educated at Princeton University, where he majored in comparative literature and pursued a practical and critical course of study in the visual arts. He lives in New York City and works at Harper's Magazine.
your work leaves me choked. strangling my own personal sense of vocation. forcefully sharpening my perspective.
astringent. spartan. breathless. brilliant.
Posted by: Govinda R. W. | March 01, 2006 at 07:00 PM
very interesting idea.
Posted by: Venus | March 14, 2006 at 07:00 PM
I love the multi-layered levels of appearance and reality. Great resonances in this photograph!
Posted by: xerxes | March 17, 2006 at 07:00 PM
Just read your Harper's weekly wrap up. Best one i've read for a long time. I look forward to more.
Posted by: jrh | June 05, 2006 at 08:00 PM
Hey I am a Zaidi too ! I am also into the arts and cinema too! Good luck rafil kroll-zaidi.
Posted by: Muntazir Zaidi | May 02, 2007 at 08:00 PM