Shabiha Nur Khatoon
Shutter-happy Shikha Khanna’s album is chock-a-bloc with cute snaps of newborns, would-be moms, priceless family moments and all those stills we desperately want not to lose in the ceaseless flux of life
We all cherish our childhood memories but with the passage of time the memories slowly fade. An additional difficulty is that we don’t have enough snaps of the memorable moments of our lives. The emotional void one feels of not having childhood photos while going through the family album is choking.
Meet Shikha Khanna who loves to capture all the cute and innocent moments of life. Shikha is possibly India’s first photographer who specialises in photographing newborns, would-be moms, pets, as well as creating family albums.
She captures the special moments of a child growing up by getting involved in the daily affairs of the newborn. She began her love affair with child photography in her teens.
“I was born and brought up in Delhi and completed my degree in photography from the International College of Professional Photography. I casually participated in an inter-college competition and was awarded the first prize for my work which encouraged me to take a sneak peek into a child’s world. My father was supportive but other family members were a bit reluctant due to the fact that there are few women photographers in India and baby photography, at that time, was a new and unheard of thing. My near and dear ones were not sure whether the profession would at all be a rewarding one,” says Shikha.
The shutterbug’s father is her inspiration who gave his daughter loads of confidence at a time when there was nobody around willing to support her.
Shikha runs the company ‘Kids Say Cheese’ and has done a number of projects with various schools like DPS International, Aravalli International School, Learning Lighthouse and Cambridge University (London). She is also involved with ‘Delhi Poetree’, a project of shooting 200 contemporary poets.
The young photographer has done a lot of work with street children including photo presentations for social causes for ICONGO NGO award functions and Foothpathshala, and would like to contribute to society through her photography.
Shikha has been teaching photography for the past two years and was a professor at JIIMs. She is presently teaching at K.R Mangalam School and has been conducting photography workshops under the banner ‘Photography Made Light’ since 2007.
“Being in the world of children is my passion. I choose to specialise in this particular field about which hardly anybody knows anything in our country. I have done several assignments but one memorable one I work for was one involving DPS International School. I visited the school for three months to document the children and their activities. My efforts were later showcased in an exhibition on the school premises and the photographs are still on display after 13 years,” she says.
Shikha says: “I have a huge collection of photos documenting the various stages of my life. I know how I looked at each stage. My friends never had great photos of them and I realised as you grow up how precious these photos become. I decided to make this my profession and create memories for families that they can cherish forever. I love being with kids. I find in my profession a means of expressing my spiritual experiences and hence, no other field of photography attracted me as much,” she says.
Shikha likes to work with natural light and shoot people in their own environment.
She believes every human face glows with an inner light and likes to capture that light in her photographs.
“Spontaneity and the ability to connect with all kinds of people drive me and I thrive on natural light as I find it comfortable and challenging at the same time. I shoot babies, infants and pregnant women who tend to get a tad stiff in the presence of heavy equipment. Harsh light is not good for my little angels,” signs off Shikha.
