Artist: Sammya Brata

Medium: Photography

Edition: 1/1

Collection: Split Stories

Diptych specifications- 1920x2400

Individual images available in their original resolution.

Both shots composed in the year - 2020

About the piece:

"With great power comes great responsibility", is a common belief that gets through our daily lives quite often. This collage depicts the opposite- sometimes, responsibilities take the lead of making someone powerful too.

In this Split-screen- there are two individuals in the two images. First person being someone who is fulfilling their responsibility as a "Bahurupiya" or mimicker of the Goddess of power- Kali, for religious festival. The other person in the second image is a street stunt artist balancing themselves on a tightrope to meet their day's end. Both of these individuals from the south of Bengal have taken up the due responsibilities of influencing their surroundings- people either worship them or look at them with awe. They might be just ordinary people throughout the day, but when they are carrying out their responsibilities, they become invincible.

The Hindu mythology recognises Kali as one of the most ferocious and powerful deities. Parvati, a beautiful and composed goddess, was created to help battle and subdue evil spirits. Parvati confidently marched into combat, but when she was confronted by the demons, she furrowed her brow and her wrathful form, Kali, emerged from ashes. Kali is an active force that resides in every woman. The little girl who walks a thin piece of rope each day to feed her family, Kali resides in one and all. Hence these two photographs from the depth of Bengal stitched in a seamless collage is a true tribute to the inner WOMAN-POWER – love and respect for the everyday chores that they perform.

About the collection: When people ask me about my fairly popular work on split-screen images, I very candidly tell them that to begin with, they are extremely difficult to visualize - the execution part comes much later. And more often than not, it is quite a daunting task to combine 2 or more frames together as one coherent story since most them are not remotely connected to each other, both in terms of theme as well as composition. Well, this interesting concept is basically a sub-set of the tested mechanism of DIPTYCH art (pronounced as "dip-tick," which has a Greek origin in "dis," meaning two, and "ptykhe," meaning fold) which combines in two pieces of artwork in a single frame or are presented together without technically modifying the artworks in any form or shape. This collection of PHOTOGRAPHY DIPTYCHS called “Split Stories” comprises of 10 such seamless yet evocative 1/1 collage-compositions created with some of my strongest photographs shot around the world aimed at conveying a deeper message. The collectors essentially get 2 photographs with the value of ONE.

About the artist- Sammya Brata is an award-winning street and documentary photographer, who has won the Canon Photo Marathon India in 2019 and has been an established educator, curator, mentor and a two-time TEDx speaker.

License: Primary NFT holder is free to use in advertising, display privately and in groups, including virtual galleries, documentaries, and essays by holder of the NFT, as long as creator is credited. Provides no rights to create commercial merchandise, commercial distribution, or derivative works. Copyright remains with creator.