Q and Rii dripped in Holi colour!

Q turns badass Krishna while the sexy Rii takes cover. The cool couple went on a psychedelic trip, dripping in colour
I have a thing for colours. Loud ones. Anyone who knows me well, also knows about my fetish for the psychedelic. Perhaps, the prime reason is that I am a devoted fan of Manga, the Japanese graphic novel form. I find a beautiful harmony between Manga as a form and our very own homegrown pop calendar art.Cinematically, no one has really explored this form in India as has Takashi Miike, or Sion Sono, in Japanese contemporary cinema. We decided to pitch the shoot somewhere in this zone — the colours of calendar art fusing with Manga-style graphic action. The idea: the eternal artist and his muse, but instead of painting the nude muse on a canvas, this contemporary artist would spray paint the muse herself. So when Calcutta Times asked Rii and me to do a photoshoot for Holi, we knew that it would be fun. We met Kaustav Saikia, the photographer, and started to think. Holi is one of the brightest and sexiest festivals in the world, right up there with the Rio carnival in Brazil, both having pagan roots.
Holi is a riot of colour and madness, and is one of the only days when a morally upright society let its hair down and breaks down the boundary between the man and the woman. The woman’s body in the nude, has always been a fascination for artists. The sheer beauty and grace never fail to generate inspiration. But, there is a huge issue about nudity in India. We seem to have forgotten that books like the Kama Sutra were written here, and sexuality was studied as a subject as complex as quantum physics. I see nudity as being pure. Both Rii and I are quite uninhibited, and celebrate our bodies as they are. Our love for each other extends naturally to the love for our bodies as well. Shame is something that a patriarchal society thrust upon us over centuries. With the onslaught of packaged sexuality being sold constantly by Bollywood and the glitter brigade, our stance has always been to get past the titillation and beyond the idea of shame.
Holi is a happy festival. A festival to forget enmity, build a universal language of love and understanding between human beings — something we sorely need in our times. Violence has perpetrated our society in a way that is overwhelming. I found the makeover of the pichkari, to the toy gun form, very interesting. We decided to use these toys in the shoot. Rii loves picking up cheap toys from fairs and street corners, and we always admire the dexterity and imagination of these street artists who make something out of nothing. The toy gun pichkari is our homage to the evergreen Kolkata street artist and a protest against violence.
We live in digital times. With this photo feature, we have tried to come up with a concept that treads the fine line between the past and the future. We had a blast shooting these photos. We hope that our playfulness and honesty come through.Full Coverage: Holi