Smart shots

Acclaimed artist Yusuf Arakkal’s son Shibu Arakkal is an award-winning photo artist who has garnered international respect with his photographic art across a diverse range of works shown in over 50 shows spanning a career of 20 years. His works embrace abstraction, minimalism and Zen philosophy as well as fuse traditional techniques of printmaking with modern technology.

Arakkal is one of the few Indians to have won the prestigious ‘Lorenzo il Magnifico’ gold prize in digital art for his work Constructing Life at the Florence Biennale 2013 in Italy. Arakkal also coined the term ‘iPhonography’ — artistic expression using the iPhone and the photographic works as ‘iPhonographs’. His creation of photographic art using iPhonography is technologically experimental, even internationally, but still on the cutting edge of image creation and reproduction. He has the heart of a painter and the mind of a photographer; which is evident in his work, leaving the viewer to navigate the complex lines of the seen and the unseen. His works have found homes in private and institutional collections across India, China, Singapore, Australia, Italy and New York.

Arakkal’s daughter Zarah is a driving force in his relentless desire to create a body of photographic art as a legacy. When he is not working, his passions are evangelising the magic of analogue photography and indulging his love for motorcycles — be it riding, or designing an exclusive machine that will showcase his aesthetic mind. He calls his latest works as ‘iPhonography’ which he feels is the essence of artistic expression and experimentation using the iPhone and his photographic works born out of this expression are what he calls ‘iPhonographs’.

Passionate about his latest body of work, Shibu explains, “My expression of art is technologically experimental, but still on the cutting edge of image creation and reproduction in relation to analogue and archival giclée printing techniques. This unconventional treatment of modern technology to revive the romance of print brings a surreal quality to smartphone photography. In coining the term ‘iPhonography’, I wished to create a completely new genre of photography, where the focus is not on the functional ability (or lack thereof) of the iPhone camera but to put the onus back on artistic ability, especially while using a basic photographic device. In my iPhonographic practices, I tend not to use too many applications during or post photography. In editing, too, I prefer to use the iOS native editing application. In rare cases, I use professional photography software to overlay a film feel, creating montages or multi layered photographic works. Hence, it becomes photographic art that is instantly relatable and easier to identify with as opposed to traditional art forms because cameras have become integral to phones and smartphone manufacturers ensure that they are truly cutting edge. This makes for great challenges in the creation of interpretative and highly artistic photographic works. To then reproduce these digital works physically in the widest range of photographic print forms, is one of the most profound kinds of artistic experiences,” adds Shibu.