Raveena Grover

About Raveena's work

baal | बाल

a photoseries showcasing the practises, beauty and ubiquity of hair on South Asian bodies. Each image displays areas of the body where hair grows and is seen as a conventional or controversial beauty trope in the mainstream. My idea for this project was to disregard the western gaze and not just embrace, but normalise and romanticise hair on South Asian bodies. It provides warmth, traps dirt and is an innate part of our genetics and eons-long cultural practices. This photoseries was shot on Gadigal Nura by sohan judge and directed and conceptualised by raveena grover.

neela | नीला

meaning blue. queer south asian existence complex, painful and neela. how we experience the world, love and community makes us beautiful and resilient. this photoseries explores the duality and symbiosis of being queer and brown. I wanted to portray the ornateness and extravagance of south asian cultures, showing the subjects interacting with traditional and regal elements of our cultures against a backdrop of blue. This photoseries was shot on Gadigal Land at The Photo Studio, and this project was created by raveena grover in collaboration with ammar jammal (photographer) and manjurah sn (henna artist).

Image descriptions

baal

these photos depict a series of brown skinned femme-presenting people practising various methods of hair care, from plaiting to combing. the series also depicts legs praying in namaz. all photos are taken against a dark red background, with intersecting tones of brighter red and shadowy black. 

neela

these photos show queer south asians in various poses and types of intimacy, with themselves, each other and south asian cultural objects. each image is extravagant and depicts the subjects wearing hues of blue and gold, against blue backgrounds, and heavy, ornate jewellery, flowers, bright make up with colourful dupattas and fruit around them.