Guftgu
Anshika Varma
Offset Projects
English, Malayalam, Nepali, Tamil, Urdu.
Edited and Curated by: Anshika Varma
Contributors: Adira Thekkuveettil, Amarnath Praful, Arko Datto, Arun Vijai Mathavan, Cheryl Mukherjee, Diwas Raja KC, Jaisingh Nageshwaran, Nandita Raman,Noon Meem, Uma Bista.
10 zines in a hardback slipcase.
First edition (of two)
148 x 210 mm
2020
ISBN Not Available
Offset began the Guftgu (which means conversation) Talk Series to bring together conversations with some of the most important young contemporary photographers in South Asia (which has also resulted in their first publication!). The Guftgu Talk Series found its roots in the desire for critical engagement and discussion with practitioners of lens and book based media. The focus of these talks is to expand our education in photography, not just via established names from the Photographic West but also to create our own circles of solidarity and learning and create a stronger voice of representation in the South East Asia Region. Constructed as a curated collection by Offset Projects, each of the zines included in this edition have been put together keeping in consideration the intent and motivations behind the subject of the work.
Guftgu looks at the interrogations and practices of 10 contemporary photographers in South Asia presented as individual chapters designed in context to each artists’ practice and process. The works featured inquires on identity formation and history building through perspectives of gender, caste and inheritance among many others. The works incorporated in this curation expand on a growing visual language and offers a complex study of the region through personal responses by photographers to their contemporary climates.
About the Curator
Anshika Varma is a photographer and curator with an interest in personal, collective and mythical histories. Through her work, Anshika looks at exploring the intricate relationship between memory and object as markers of identity. Her personal projects have been exhibited through various galleries in India, Italy and New York. She was invited to participate at the Chennai Photo Festival 2016 & 2019, Kochi Biennale 2014, New York Biennale for Contemporary Art 2013, India Art Fair 2012 & 2013 and the Florence Biennial in 2009. Her awards include the “Lorenzo Il Magnifico” award for photography at the Florence Biennale in 2009.
Her works have been published by various National and International media such as Bloomberg Businessweek, The Sunday Guardian, National Geographic, Time Out, Tehelka, The Rolling Stones, Vogue and People Magazine. She has also worked on various book projects with the HCL Foundation, Mahindra Rise, Vodafone Foundation, Roli Books, Hachette Publishing (India), Random House(India) and The Tehelka Foundation.
She is a strong believer in the power behind inclusive education and has conducted art therapy programs for children from challenging social and economic strata. She has also been a part of the education workshops for children for the Angkor Photo Festival (2013-Present) and the Delhi PhotoFestival (2013-2015). She has been the Photography curator for the Contemporary Arts Week, New Delhi (2014) and been part of the Festival Secretariat for the Delhi Photo Festival (2013).
anshikavarma.com
(source: https://www.anshikavarma.com/)
About the Publisher
Officiated in 2019, Offset Projects is a curatorial proposition by artist Anshika Varma to create channels of engagement in photography and book making outside of the fragilities of art echo chambers. The initiative exists within the form of a fluid collective, inviting collaborators to play and experiment within its unstructured identity.
The Offset Bookshop is a curated collection of independent publishing projects focussing on lens media from South Asia. The bookshop is an extension of the work and programs by Offset Projects, an initiative by founder and artist Anshika Varma, to look at intersections of photography and book-making.
The Offset Pitara, our travelling library, focuses on voices from the Global South, and its diaspora, with expanded programs and exhibitions, artist talks, workshops, residencies, curated reading rooms and collaborative exercises in publishing. Their publishing ethos comes from the urgency to work with the book as a site of companionship and support, centering relationship-building as the core tenet of our publishing practice.
Their ethos is that story telling lies at the heart of human creative energy and their wish to make a space for collective engagement, meaningful critique and reflective inquiry.
offsetbookshop.com
(source: https://www.offsetbookshop.com/)
