Month long Indian Photo Festival back in Hyderabad starts from today

The eighth edition of the Indian Photo Festival (IPF) will be back in Hyderabad at the State Art Gallery, Madhapur, on November 18. This year, the month-long festival will be an on-ground event. Due to the Covid pandemic, the event was hosted online in the last two years. More than 5,000 participants from different parts of the world are said to have registered for the event, bringing emerging and established photographers, photography enthusiasts and photo editors for workshops, talks, masterclasses and exhibitions, all under one roof.

“In the last two years, we conducted physical exhibitions, but the talk sessions and workshops were conducted online. I always believe that art should be experienced in person to be appreciated. The response for registrations has been overwhelming,” Aquin Mathews, the festival director said.

The festival will be exhibiting a diverse range of work, from photojournalist Smita Sharma’s cross-border human trafficking and Italian photographer Diego Fedele’s highlights of the absurdity of war to Ana Bloom’s lens on the refugee crisis and Hyderabad photographer Nishat Fatima’s documents of the LGBTQIA community.

After the IPF announced an open invitation to



emerging photographers to showcase their work, Aquin said that photographers from more than 60 countries came forward and shared nearly 800 images. “We had shortlisted the submission list to 10 physical and 15 digital exhibitions. Over 12 speakers would be joining the event,” said Aquin.

Besides these workshops at the State Art Gallery, a few other exhibitions will unfold at Alliance Francaise, KBR National Park walkway, and Salar Jung Museum in collaboration with Goethe Zentrum Hyderabad. A few pop-up exhibitions will also take place at Durgam Cheruvu and metro stations in the city.

One of the highlights of the event is a group exhibition by 50 women street photographers from 20 countries, curated by Gulnara Samoilova, founder of the Women Street Photography collective. Indian and international photographers associated with National Geographic magazine — Dominique Hildebrand, Smita Sharma, Srinivas Kuruganti, Sabeena Gadihoke, and Julia Coddington — will offer free portfolio reviews for emerging photographers.

The festival will go on until December 18. For the complete schedule and other details, check  www.indianphotofest.com