Artist: Sammya Brata

Medium: Photography

Price: 0.15 ETH

Edition: 1/1

The beauty of natural light when it appears as a tool to create back-lit photographs/portraits, is exemplary. It not only creates a pattern breaking infusion into an otherwise mundane documentary shot, but it distinctly portrays your main subject as the fulcrum of focus in a photograph that might have more one secondary subject. I shot this image by chance while documenting Chaath Puja, a Hindu festival in Calcutta early in the morning when I spotted this magic light along the stairs leading up to Mullick Ghat, where the devotees offer their prayers to Sun God. If one looks at the image closely, only one subject, with light appearing from the backside, is climbing down the stairs where-as the others are walking in the opposite direction. This creates a spot-light effect and hence the media has been crowned as “The show-stopper".

Image specifications- 6016 × 4016

Shot in year - 2021

Device- Nikon D750

About the collection: Chasing light or "finding light" has been quite a fascination for me right from the childhood days. Not just because of the sheer visual delight that it brings on to the table, but the way it adds a strong element of story-telling to your otherwise mundane photographs. I have been shooting "God-light" both early in the morning during winters as well as late afternoon but one thing is in common- these "dramatic" images often end up inducing the feeling of "enlightenment" and contentment in the entire process.

This is the first series called "Enlightenment" and has 15 images shot across India primarily during the winter season when the impact of sun-rays is the maximum. You can connect with me on Instagram @Deckle_Edge for better understanding.

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, mentor and a TEDx speaker.