In September 2022, the German photographer Mr. Dirk Skiba visited three Indian metro cities – Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata. For many years he has been travelling across the world to take photographs of contemporary eminent and significant writers, and in Kolkata he wanted a very long list of Bengali writers and a few writers of Indian English. Voice of Kolkata interacted with Mr Sirka while he was doing a photoshoot of few writers of Kolkata at Baitanik, a heritage house in Bhawanipur.
‘Kolkata is a beautiful city,’ Mr. Skiba once said while walking through the city. His dedication in capturing the writers with his camera has inspired many of us in the city. The most striking part of his project has been the locations that he chose for his subjects : the walls, the trees, the abandoned houses, the closed gates, the bamboo structures, which were erected for the upcoming Durga Puja. Mr. Skiba has visited many puja pandals too and he praised the beautiful creation of our city’s artists.
Poet Anindita Bose was the Guide and Project Manager of Mr Skiba’s Kolkata photography tour. Along with her, Ms. Namrota Purakayastha, Ms. Jhuma Das, and Mr. Snehasis Sarkar, respectively student of Literature, Journalism and Business Administration worked as as intern cum coordinator. They were very happy as they got to learn how global projects work and how passionate people are in Germany. It was also a great opportunity to greet the popular authors from the city.
Mr Dirk Skiba photographed Mr. Shirshendu Mukherjee, Mr. Subodh Sarkar, Mr. Srijato, Mr. Amit Chaudhuri, Mr. Sonnet Mondal, Mr. Hindol Bhattacharjee, Mr. Ranajit Das, Mr. Tushar Dhawal Singh, Mr. Mrityunjay Kumar Singh, Mr. Siddharth Sethia, Mr. Amar Mitra, Mr. Swapnamoy Chakraborty, Mr. Gourab Chakraborty, Mr. Angshuman Kar, Mr. Abhimanyu Mahato, Mr. Shamik Ghosh, Mr. Devdan Chaudhuri, Ms. Mandakranta Sen, Ms. Sutapa Sarkar, Ms. Jayati Roy, Ms. Chaitali Chattopadhya and Ms. Sanjukta Dasgupta.
Mr. Skiba had captured moments with Film maker Rajaditya Banerjee, actor Rajdeep Sarkar, and dancer Aparupa Banerjee also.
Mr. Dirk Skiba had started his journey almost ten years back, and has visited several countries in the world.
It was great experience for writers of Kolkata that a man came to the city and took photos of them to Germany.
For two days the shoot also took place in the beautiful and heritage Baitanik in Bhawanipur. Mr. Biplab Bose should be thanked for his help for the shoot.
Readers can see Mr. Dirk Skiba’s works here:
http://dirk-skiba-fotografie.de/authors-by-country