Durga Rajah

Durga Rajah holds a BFA from the School of Images Arts, Ryerson University. She is interested in the formal and material aspects of photography, as well as in its potential as an expressive medium. Durga approaches photography as a way of making art and has exhibited her work in Toronto and Vancouver. Recent awards include Maximum Exposure 4th Year Best in Show Award (2020), receiving a Solo Exhibition at the Ryerson Image Centre; David & Anna Bulmash Innovation Award (2019); Maximum Exposure 3rd Year Best in Show Smokestack Studio Printing Award (2019). To view her work please visit https://durgarajah.com

AGO: Tell us a bit about your practice.
Rajah: A Measure of Time: 3 Seconds attempts to convey the essence of time through the photographic image. In this work, time is represented in terms of the phenomenology of the body in motion. In each shot, I express my bodily subjectivity in a carefully executed movement within a fixed measure of time. In shaping these movements, I turn to my experience of performance, in which I have learnt about form, rhythm, presence, gesture and affect. In these photographs, I attempt to shift the emphasis of the representation, from an impression of movement, to a sense of time encapsulating movement.

AGO: What was the inspiration for this artwork or series?
Rajah: A Measure of Time: 3 Seconds is a series which addresses the photographic representation of time. John Baldessari’s Strobe Series/Futurist: Dog on Leash (for Balla), 1975, was a point of departure. Initially, I tried his strobe technique, but then opted for a continuous light method that better suited the sense of time that I wanted to achieve. Hiroshi Sugimoto’s on going Theatres series, in which he uses long exposures to produce images of movie theatres was an important influence in this regard. Sugimoto’s exposures were held for the length of the movie. This use of duration in photography helped me find my own approach to capturing movements of my body in a way that materializes time while giving emotional affect. 

Durga Rajah, A Measure of Time: 3 Seconds (iii), 2020, Large Format Negative, Print Dimensions Variable. Image courtesy of the artist. 

 

AGO: Tell us about a place or a space where you most love making your work?
Rajah: As a photographer, I work both on location and in the studio depending on the project. I find that my ideas for the work usually directs me to the place in which I make it and, in turn, the environment influences the way in which the work progresses. Much of my recent work has had a conceptual orientation and has been shot in the studio. I find working in the studio space to be very contemplative and this allows me to make clear decisions about the way I make my images.

AGO: Are you in dialogue with any other artists or creative peers about your practice? If so, how does this dialogue feed your work?
Rajah: I am in dialogue with my peers from my time in the Photography Studies program at Ryerson University. I find that this close engagement with my colleagues helps me to develop my ideas in greater depth and enables me to see the imperfections in my work.

Follow Durga @durgarajj