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Naveen Kishore

Birth:17th January 1953, Kolkata
Publisher, lighting designer, graphic designer, photographer, documentary filmmaker.

Setup The Seagull School of Publishing in 2012, the only one of its kind publishing academy in India that consolidates over thirty years of experience in publishing great minds and crafting exquisite books to inspire and produce the next generation of publishers, book designers and editors.

Established Seagull Books London and Seagull Books New York in 2005 - a natural extension of the existing publishing programme dedicated to quality arts and culture publishing. From documentation of cultural history in the making, to building a climate of critique, its focus is firmly on the alternative and the experimental, and on the socially committed.

Setup the PeaceWorks project 2003 - an initiative of the Seagull Foundation for the Arts, that has a portfolio of projects with the overall aim of building peace, of strengthening values of mutual coexistence and respect for all communities.

Established the Seagull Arts and Media Resource Centre in 1999 - a space that functions as a reference library, an archive, an institution for the dissemination of various forms of arts, a performance space/exhibition centre, as well as providing a meeting point where debates/discussions on the Arts and their surrounding culture and politics can take place.

Established the Seagull Bookstore in 1997, independent arts, humanities and social sciences bookstore in Calcutta.

Two particular projects in black and white are of special interest and concern:

One: photographing female impersonators from varied theatre practices. In particular, from Manipur, Punjab and Bengal.

Two: Photographing Chapal Bhaduri, a female impersonator of the Bengali folk theatre practice called Jatra. The latter also led to being exhibited and published as a part of a curated photographic exhibition called Woman/Goddess. The exhibition traveled all over India and also to the UK and USA.

Started to publish theatre journal called STQ (Seagull Theatre Quarterly) a national-level theatre journal that would fulfill a networking and developmental function, linking up theatre workers through the country who are not part of the commercial mainstream on which the media tends to focus almost exclusively; providing access to significant happenings; allowing information, ideas and experiences to travel freely in performance circles; and bringing theatre workers and audiences serious critique, theoretical analysis, responsible, informed reviewing and information dissemination. Hands on involvement with this project led to traveling all over the country photographing performance and interviewing performers.

Founded The Seagull Foundation for the Arts- a non-profit organization devoted to furthering the Arts in all their various forms-in 1987.

Started to present fine art and photography exhibitions in 1984.

Working extensively in the theatre led to setting up a publishing house called Seagull Books Private Limited in 1982-a publishing programme in the arts and , exclusively focusing on drama, film, art, cultural studies.

Interest in black and white photography led to teaching myself to take pictures.

The early years were devoted to photographing performances: theatre, dance, music.

Over the years the photographs have been seen in national exhibitions and have also been part of a Sotheby's auction.

Set up a theatre and advertising design and audio-visual unit called Seagull Empire in 1974 specializing in graphic design and slide and sound presentations for advertising agencies and corporates; continued to design for the theatre.

Started working life as a theatre lighting designer in 1972 in Calcutta after a Bachelor's Degree in English Literature from St Xaviers College.

About Tramp

Storyltd is delighted to present Tramp, a collection of photographs by Naveen Kishore—lighting designer, photographer and publisher. It is a collection that celebrates the spirit of walking, travelling, looking and discovering old and new worlds. There are about 75 photographs in the collection, all hand-crafted gelatine-silver prints in limited edition.

The collection is part of a series of photographs geographically spread across cities such as Berlin, Kolkata, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Kyoto, London, Oslo and Paris. The collection is subtly marked by efforts to group the untitled photographs under different thematic schemes—lines, symmetry and architecture, bright lights and long shadows, men and mannequins, reflections and the often overlooked realities of cities.

On his part, Kishore chooses not to caption his images or provide any geographical markers. “I have desisted from captioning or titling the photographs since the visuals are self-explanatory or are open to interpretation. There is no forethought and I have photographed for the mere pleasure of taking pictures,” he says.

The other pleasure, of course, is that of walking. The spontaneity implicit in his photography can be explained by the fact that Kishore, during his travels, often shot in the idle hours available between attending official appointments; choosing to walk instead of taking “a cab, bus or train” to reach his destination.

The collection takes its name from Tramp, Norwegian author Tomas Espedal’s book on the simple delights of walking, “the act of putting one foot in front of the other, moving out of a familiar house, the lonely house, and beginning a journey in which you’re never alone.”

Camera in hand, Kishore betrays the temptation of becoming permanently itinerant, as Espedal’s book notes. With his background in stage lighting and a photography habit nurtured since the 1960s, Kishore’s work escapes the usual slots of documentary, fine art or salon photography.

At its best, the frames admit to Espedal’s view: “Slowly it dawns on me: You’re happy because you’re walking.”