Its August Again!

Yes, we have decided the dates and yet again we are doing it in August.

We are starting from 16 and it continues for 4 days. Not bad I guess?

Our location is also finalized and my heart is full of happiness but my team thinks that we should not disclose it right now but its killing me. I really want to share it with you lovely people. Ugh whatever!

And yes we are even starting the entries by the end of this week, our designers are working on the posters. Expecting a lot from them. There are lot of things coming up for all the participants this year. A bigger platform, more viewership and maybe even getting published in a few magazines. *Wink*

I have already said too much. Stay tuned to the page and lots more excitement coming up! 😀

-Barnita Haldar

The Fantastic Four !

Hey folks! Its great to have a chance to have you guys around and reading through our blog.

Last Saturday we had our 2^nd Meeting where the four of us finally got a chance to come face to face. Barnita, Archie and I had met up a week back but sadly Shivangi could not make it because her friend got lost coming from the train station and it was her first time in Delhi.

So we were able to cover up a lot of ground regarding the Exhibition with all four of us present and being able to present ideas back and forth.

We had been looking around for a place to hold the exhibition for a while and I feel we are very close now to clinching the place that we really wanted for the exhibition.

We were sitting at this cafe, you know discussing things and all. And there’s this fish bowl, in which it’s got pebbles and guess what was there inside? A pet Lobster! Hah and was I hungry! We had been sitting there juggling ideas and our first Volunteer/Editor came for the interview dot on time and we were pretty impressed with her ideas and the way she worked.

Well we had to wait for a couple of hours for the next volunteer but it was still great because she was very enthusiastic and full of energy and made the wait worthwhile.

So now our Exhibition is going full steam and we are working to make it as successful as we can. Make sure you stay tuned to this blog; we’ll keep getting you constant updates about our exhibition.

Chau!

-Ashutosh Bose

Yes, We are now stronger by 2.

Being College students, I and Archie hardly had any time after Srishti got over. The new semester started along with submissions and I even interned in a News Agency. It’s pretty easy to guess how tough it was for us to handle everything at that point of time. Hence we are genuinely sorry for being dead and lost for the entire year after Srishti happened.

One thing was clear to us before we started work for this year’s exhibition; We needed more people in our team as the core members of Zarah as it was very hard to handle everything on our own.

The main question bothering us was *Whom do we ask?*

Our friends were out of the question. I believe that we can never work with our friends because somehow they never take you seriously and will always give you *Dosti ka Wasta* and be complete asses.

Yes! Finding people to share your idea and dream and see them accept it is really tough.

I met Shivangi in Pravah, an youth activation organization where I was volunteering for their annual event “Music For Harmony”. She was heading the team and I was really impressed with her dedication and work ethics, I almost immediately knew that I wanter her to be a part of Zarah. It took me 3 months to get the idea to her and tell her our dream and our concept and she is finally onboard with us for this year’s exhibiton. Happiness!

Mr. Bose, the surname is quite often found in the lores of Indian Independence . I met Ashutosh a.k.a. Mr. Bose in Delhi Photo Festival, we both were a part of Videography team responsible for documenting the whole event.

Mr. Bose is a hardworking, sincere guy and had visions and ideas that matched mine to some level. He also studies in the same college as Archie and was friends with him from before. He is also a rather good photographer and had been shooting music videos of late and we knew that we wanted him onboard for this year’s exhibiton.

Zarah now has 4 strong pillars instead of the 2 initially and we believe that it’ll give us the chance to raise the roof to the sky.

I am looking forward to all the other people who would be working with us very soon and I hope that Zarah becomes bigger and better and gets an even better response.

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-Barnita Haldar

Radiance of A New Dawn

Around an year back, two individuals chanced upon an inspiration for an idea. The idea was not new but it had not been implemented successfully yet. Pooling their mutual frustration of not getting a chance to display their work or get more exposure, they decided to create their own platform. And thus Zarah was born.

Zarah was conceived as a platform for up and coming artists; photographers, painters, sculptors etc. It would showcase their work to a broader strata of people and it would give them their duly deserved exposure.

Armed with nothing else than an idea these two people set out to get things done, so much to do and so less a time.

The first problem to tackle was the location of the exhibition. After a lot of travelling around the city and not being taken seriously by anyone they decided to do the exhibition in a residential basement and put in an investment into the cause they believed in.

Then came the task of finding participants to come and display their work. Finding people was a difficult task in itself but then they also had to realize our idea and believe in it. After initial rejections they ended up being more than happy for the number of entries they received but they sadly had to turn down a few people too, due to lack of space.

Everything had been planned but when it came to calling a known personality to inaugurate the event they were almost heartbroken to learn that they had overlooked a tiny problem. 13th of August, their opening day also happened to be Raksha Bandhan and almost everybody was busy with their families.

Even after this initial hiccup, Srishti (The name of Last year’s exhibition, the first one) had a footfall of 250 plus people and ended up displaying works of 30 different artists; photographers, painters and sketchers.

The exhibition concluded on the 15th of August with a musical performance and with heavy hearts. It was a dream for those two, for me being one of those two. I just couldn’t believe that all those months of hard work had ended so soon. I wanted it to go on forever but then as it is with life, it was time to move on. Drum Roll. Curtain fall.

I would sincerely like to thank Priyanka Barua, Vanya Rajput, Vikesh Ghosh for the amount of time they devoted to what we believed in and they made our belief so much stronger.

I would also like to thank Priyam, Abhinav, Aman Negi, Ishan, Chandni, Jeeshan, Sargam for doing their bit to help us out in this endeavor of ours.

Last and most importantly, I would like to thank Barnita, the second one of the two, the main force behind the ideas, the one with the command and the one who brought together everything ever so perfectly and beautifully. It would have been totally impossible to even think of such an exhibition without you. Hats off to you partner.

I for one was just another straw in the hat or maybe like the glue. I messed up a lot and sometimes went dizzy emptying rolls of thread but it was an amazing experience.

It was one hell of a ride, Srishti was, but enough about last year. This year its just about to go up a notch and we’ll be updating you about everything that goes on.

Cheers.

 

-Archie Misra