Sarker Protick

{{Infobox person

| name = Sarker Protick

| image = Portrait - Sarker Protick (Photograph - Jasper Bastian).JPG

| alt =

| caption = Protick in 2014

| birth_name =

| birth_date = {{Birth year and age|1986}}

| birth_place = Dhaka, Bangladesh

| death_date =

| death_place =

| nationality = Bangladeshi

| other_names =

| occupation = Photojournalist, teacher

| years_active = 2011–present

| known_for = Photography

| notable_works =

| website = {{URL|www.sarkerprotick.com}}

}}

Sarker Protick ({{langx|bn|সরকার প্রতিক}}) is a Bangladeshi photographer and visual artist.{{Cite magazine |url=https://www.newyorker.com/culture/photo-booth/sarker-protick-what-remains|title=Sarker Protick's 'What Remains'|first=Genevieve|last=Fussell|magazine=The New Yorker}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.nationalgeographic.com/photography/proof/2014/04/17/musings-sarker-proticks-of-river-and-lost-lands/|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180424140043/https://www.nationalgeographic.com/photography/proof/2014/04/17/musings-sarker-proticks-of-river-and-lost-lands/|url-status=dead|archive-date=April 24, 2018|title=Vanishing Act: The Disappearing Banks of the Padma River|date=April 17, 2014|website=Photography}}

Life and work

Protick is a lecturer at Pathshala-South Asian Media Institute and co-curator at Chobi Mela International Photography Festival. He is a former member of the VII Photo Agency and is represented by East Wing Gallery.

He was chosen by the British Journal of Photography as 'One to watch' in 2014.{{cite magazine |last1=Bainbridge|first1=Simon|title=BJP's Ones to Watch in 2014 unveiled|url=http://www.bjp-online.com/2014/01/bjps-ones-to-watch-in-2014-unveiled/|magazine=British Journal of Photography |date=January 6, 2014 |access-date=December 13, 2014}}

Publications

=Joint publication=

Astres Noirs. Chose Commune, 2016. With Katrin Koenning.{{cite web|access-date=2021-08-19|title=Astres Noirs|url=https://gupmagazine.com/books/astres-noirs/|date=20 September 2016|website=GUP Magazine}} {{ISBN|978-2-9548777-2-3}}. Edition of 1500 copies.
Second, augmented edition with different cover. Chose Commune, 2017. {{ISBN|979-10-96383-03-0}}. Edition of 1500 copies.

=Contributions to publications=

Under the Banyan Tree. South Asian Media Academy, 2011. Catalogue of images by 15 photographers from Pathshala in Bangladesh. {{ISBN|9789843334442}}. Includes In Midnight Black by Protick.

Reception

The book Astres Noirs was the result of Protick distributing his work using social media. On Instagram, Protick in Bangladesh and Koenning in Australia shared hundreds of photographs. Co-directors of publishers Chose Commune, Cécile Poimboeuf-Koizumi and Vasantha Yogananthan, following the two artists on social networks, noticed artistic affinities in dialogue that banished distance. In their studio in Paris, far removed from Bangladesh and Australia, they developed a book concept that replicated the illumination of the mobile phone screen and its constant flow of imagery;

On black paper the pages [are] printed in silver ink with traces of a harsh and blinding light originally generated by the smartphone. Thus, the light of the images is not white, but a metallic gray, paradoxically evoking the essential material of film photography: silver salt. From an all-digital universe, the photographs of Protick and Koenning retain the luminance of the screen thanks to the unusual printing process that transforms them into a malleable material from which the photographic narrative is constructed. Bound in a sort of Japanese fold (each of the pages is double, folded on itself from the top), the book is punctuated with "hidden" images, printed on the inside of the fold.Translation of excerpt from Perreault, L. (2017). "Review of Sarker Protick et Katrin Koenning, Astres noirs, Chose commune, Paris, 2016, 168 pages, 91 photographs." Ciel variable, (106), 94–94.

As José Alberto Caro Díaz expresses it;

German photographer Katrin Koenning and Bangladesh-based photographer Sarker Protick collaborate despite distance. This work represents photographs taken with a mobile phone camera, capturing the ordinary like a drop of water or a ray of light, and transforming it, discovering an unexplored world [and] show a passion for the world that surrounds them.{{Cite book|last=Caro Díaz|first=José A.|title=El Silencio de la Oscuridad: Inmersión en las Bodegas vivas de Chiclana de la Frontera, thesis for the Degree in Fundamentals of Architecture, Universidad de Sevilla, Higher Technical School of Architecture of Seville|publisher=Universidad de Sevilla|date=June 2019|location=Seville, Spain|pages=13}}

The New Yorker reviewed Protick's What Remains, noting that it was made over a year of return visits "to learn how his grandparents felt as they confronted old age," and for which he developed a overexposed high key technique. The British Journal of Photography identifies the photographer's "emptiness of his compositions and their minimalist colour palette alluding to loss," in discussing the series in their 2014 issue "Ones to Watch";

What Remains is a touching portrait of a Bangladeshi couple, shot in the last weeks of the woman's life by her grandson, Sarker Protick, who brings a subtle hand and economy of style to a difficult and very personal subject; the emptiness of his compositions and their minimalist colour palette alluding to loss in place of a strict narrative.

Manik Katyal, founder of Emaho Magazine, describes Protick's adaptability and intuitive approach when intending to photograph Bangladesh's largest waterway, the Padma, but on discovering how erosion of the river's shore disadvantaged the communities that live beside and depend on the river for their livelihoods, he made that his subject;

Of River and Lost Lands deals with an important subject to present to a wider audience, as it lacks visibility in Bangladesh. He uses photography in a decidedly unsettling manner [in dealing with loss]

Exhibitions

Dhaka Art Summit 2023{{cite web |url=https://www.dhakaartsummit.org/ |title=DAS 2023 |website=Dhaka Art Summit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230207111548/https://www.dhakaartsummit.org/ |archive-date=7 February 2023}}
Chobi Mela VII International Photography Festival, 2013
Festival of Promenades Photographiques Vendome 2012 & 2013, France{{Cite web |url=http://promenadesphotographiques.com/ |title=Promenades photographiques de Vendôme |website=Promenades Photographiques}}
Noorderlicht Photo festival 2012, Netherlands
Tokyo Month of Photography 2013
Of River and Lost Lands, Photography Oxford festival, 2014{{Cite news |url=https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2014/sep/27/photography-oxford-festival-in-pictures|title=Photography Oxford festival 2014 – in pictures|date=September 26, 2014|work=The Guardian}}

File:To Enter the Sky - Protick Sarker.jpg

Awards

2012: Prix Mark Grosset pour les écoles internationales de photographie, France{{Cite news |url=https://www.thedailystar.net/talking-images-16659 |title=Talking Images |date=March 22, 2014 |work=The Daily Star}}
2012: Winner of World Bank Art Program, US
2014: 'Ones to Watch' – (featured), British Journal of Photography, UK
2014: Selected to participate in World Press Photo Joop Swart Master class, Netherlands{{Cite news |url=http://www.daily-sun.com/details_yes_23-05-2014_Sarker-Protick-on-Joop-Swart-Masterclass-2014_863_1_14_1_15.html |title=Sarker Protick on Joop Swart Masterclass 2014 |work=Daily Sun |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140719223403/http://www.daily-sun.com/details_yes_23-05-2014_Sarker-Protick-on-Joop-Swart-Masterclass-2014_863_1_14_1_15.html |archive-date=July 19, 2014}}
2015: Photo District News{{'}}s 30 Emerging Photographers{{cite magazine |title=PDN's 30 2015: New and Emerging Photographers to Watch |url=http://www.pdns30.com/gallery/2015/#25-Sarker_Protick |magazine=Photo District News |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150226174739/http://www.pdns30.com/gallery/2015/#grid |archive-date=26 February 2015}}
2015: World Press Photo Award (for the story "What Remains"){{Cite web |url=https://www.worldpressphoto.org/collection/photo/2015/29542/1/2015-sarker-protick-dls2-aj |title=2015 Sarker Protick DLS2-AJ |website=World Press Photo}}{{Cite news |url=https://www.thedailystar.net/sarker-protick-bring-home-world-press-photo-award-65546 |title=Sarker Protick bring home World Press Photo Award |date=February 19, 2015 |work=The Daily Star}}{{Cite news |url=https://www.dhakatribune.com/uncategorized/2015/02/18/sarker-protick-wins-world-press-photo-award |title=Sarker Protick wins World Press Photo Award |date=February 18, 2015 |work=Dhaka Tribune}}
2019: Light Work Artist Residency, Syracuse NY.{{cite press release |title=Announcing the 2019 Light Work Artists-in-Residence |url=https://www.lightwork.org/news/announcing-the-2019-light-work-artists-in-residence/ |access-date=30 December 2021 |work=Light Work |date=13 September 2018}}