The impersonator

“I like to infuse a sense of uncertainty while I work to keep things surprising,” she says. The juxtaposition of background images and props,of clarity and blurriness,and the inclusion of “unexpected objects”—many of them painted to give them an artificial quality—all suggest our grasp on reality is tenuous because our senses may not be reliable. Gallery-owner Mortimer Chatterjee agrees with her aesthetics. “She undermines the viewers’ ability to tell whether they’re looking at a painting or a photograph,” he says,“it’s that uncertainty that’s interesting.”

Bhatt’s way of slipping into the skin of ordinary people in Sohir captivates that viewer. “My main concern,” the 34-year-old insists,“was the whole picture. The character is only a part of the picture.” Still,she concedes,“you do feel their existence for that moment.” She calls her work “performing a sculpture” and to this end has clothed herself in plastic rather than cloth “to give the draping a sculptural quality” and emphasise the folds.

In performing,she means to push away at the realism of photography. She works with a large mirror in front of her and tells me that “what you see is exactly how it was set up in the studio,” since she emphatically rejects digital modification of images as a means of arriving at what she envisions in her mind’s eye. Bhatt is adamant: “I need to see it in front of me.” Her images beg to be absorbed slowly.

Most of all,her theatrical talent should not be overlooked,for it is her character’s piercing stares that give her photographs an eerie yet tender quality that stays with the visitor after he has left the gallery. The show continues until 24 October.