About the Photographer

 

Tui grew up amidst the bustling city of Mumbai, soaking in its the raw beauty; of rusted chains at Sassoon docks in the tropical golden light, of gradually crumbling historic structures all over the city, seeing the meaning and profundity in simple exchanges between people and hard street life.

Disillusioned while completing her B.F.A. in Advertising, due to the extent of deception permeating consumer markets, using her visual creative skills in that paradigm neither sat well with her values nor perception of the world around her.

Simultaneously realizing a propensity toward photography, she dove into making some sense of these realities via camera, seeking universal thread to reachably speak to the human condition. She would find this creative process vested the power to inform against the grain of ignorance, to change that which crushes the human spirit, while creating shifts of ideas, as well as documents for posterity, in the context of the past and future.

Witnessing an explosion of life as she walked the streets with her film camera, absorbing those emotions, Tui discovered the exhilaration of stealing moments amidst the unforgiving flow of time and seeing them reappear in the dark room.

As a very visual person, the play of light had always mesmerized her; from the translucence of leaves, the vibrancy of a fresh blade of grass, the dancing reflections of rippled water, the vagabond shape-shifting cloud, to the dappled light that peeks through creating shadowy patterns; Tui reveled in their passing as much as she basked in the sparkling glee of a child on the street, the rim of light outlining the edge of a serene woman in her stall of metal utensils and the patterns of wheelchairs in a care center reflecting onto old and feeble eyes.

At the Academy of Art University, she completed her M.F.A. in Photography to then also attend the San Francisco Studio School. Under the tutelage of Lon Clark, she learnt the visual language that gave her social and personal aspirations visual form, while discovering her individuality's rapidly evolving mental model, a challenge to constantly push and translate into her photography, drawing and collage. And so began her trajectory towards several documentary projects since:
 

 

To see more work by Tui:  www.tuisigman.com

 

To message Tui:  tuisuchak11@gmail.com