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Photographer Ryan Lobo’s images are true to the phrase ‘beauty lies in the eye of the beholder’. The talented photographer also enjoys writing, painting and filmmaking, but finds photography to be the medium of ultimate representation.

“With photographs you choose your frame exactly; the exposure is yours. When it comes to editing your work, it’s all up to you. So I have a lot more control, which I appreciate and enjoy. The...
Photographer Ryan Lobo’s images are true to the phrase ‘beauty lies in the eye of the beholder’. The talented photographer also enjoys writing, painting and filmmaking, but finds photography to be the medium of ultimate representation.

“With photographs you choose your frame exactly; the exposure is yours. When it comes to editing your work, it’s all up to you. So I have a lot more control, which I appreciate and enjoy. The films are often beautiful. ‘Well shot’. They are often cut a certain way which, of late, seems to have become more choppy and sensational. A film is not yours alone. Many people work on it. You cater to an audience with films. With photos, I cater more to myself, my own personal aesthetic”, explains the artist.

Lobo has made several films for National Geographic, the Discovery Channel, Oprah Winfrey and other television networks. However, it is Lobo’s photographs that engulf the viewer, evoking mirth, compassion, sorrow and melancholy, often at the same time. His portraits separate his subjects from a crowd, bringing their individual gaze to life. In his series titled ‘Muharram’, Lobo’s images of young Shia men participating in ‘Matam’, artfully capture the spirit of joy and liberation behind the self-inflicted pain of ritual flagellation. In images contrary to these, where pain and suffering have not been a matter of choice, Lobo draws the viewer’s attention to the idea that the understanding of pain is indeed relative, and that suffering can also sometimes be a matter of opinion. In his photographs of his sister Nisha, who has a painful condition called icthyosis, Lobo portrays exactly this.

The artist’s passion and emotional intensity are also evident in his photographic series ‘Tihar Prison’, ‘Muay Thai Children’, ‘Child Marriage’, ‘Face Tattoos’, and ‘Portraits at Exorcism’ amongst many others.

Ryan Lobo was born in 1973 in Bangalore. A student of Science, the artist received his Bachelor’s degree in 1995. His most recent solo show was ‘The Wedding Season’ at Jehangir Nicholson Gallery, the National Centre for Performing Arts (NCPA), Mumbai, in 2007. Lobo has also participated in a number of group shows from the year 1998 up until 2002. The recipient of several awards and honours, Lobo’s Films have been aired on National Geographic, the Discovery Channel, Animal Planet, PBS and several other television networks. The artist lives and works in Bangalore.

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