Dear Friends, Backers and Supporters, 

I wanted to inform all of you that I have a dedicated website for Darshan that thanks all of you and your generosity. I am also offering Maa Laxmi greeting cards and the remaining 8X10 Kickstarter editioned prints to continue to support this series. Please feel free to take a look on this website.

I am very pleased to share that Maa Laxmi will be previewing at an art fair in Chelsea, New York City called Pulse, New York, 2012. The art fair runs from May 3rd to May 6th and the image will be at Booth B10 with gallerist Richard Levy gallery. Please stop in and say hi! 

Dear Darshan Backers, 
Its a big day of celebration for all of us. Darshan's new images just made their first debut on the New York Times photography Blog called Lens Blog. I encourage you to check out the link and the video that I have attached with this update. Please keep a check on my blog link to some behind the scenes footage on specifically Lord Ganesha and a special shout to B.V.S.P. 

B.V.S.P is Bhartiya Vidya Peeth School of Photography in Pune, India. This school and it's students came through as true collaborators on the Darshan project, my blog will explain and elaborate on why and how. Cheers and sincere thanks to each one of you on supporting this project to it's halfway completion point. 

New York Times Link: http://lens.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/12/09/the-beauty-and-chaos-of-the-gods/

Friends!

I break my silence from weeks of reward preparation. Take a look at my living room covered in boxes and don't miss my long receipt! Also included below is a little video of my trustee team of friends and helpers that were boxing, shipping, labeling, making lists and packaging! Credit where credit is due....  interns, Amelia Coffaro and Anahit Pogosian, helped a lot and dearest friends Heloisa Roach, Jennifer Olsen, Erika Hokanson who additionally pitched in to help out. Most rewards left last week and should be reaching many of you and the remainder will be shipped out early this week!

The magnificent printing for the prints and greeting cards was done by Duggal Labs. The Mercedez Benz of labs in New York City! A big shout out to Karl Rudisill who discovered Darshan and his supervision over the impeccable quality control. Props to Heather Gorman for being a listener and making sure everything was done on time. And lastly but not the least dearest Mr. Baldev Duggal, owner of Duggal Labs who took the project under his wing and believed in me right from the start. 

Stay tuned for more Darshan news coming soon!

PS: if you notice a a bump in the photo and wonder whats up, I'm 8 months pregnant. 

Dear Friends,
Owing to the successful fundraising of my project Darshan, I was in India September through October creating and producing the next four images in the series. I’d to invite you to my talk at the School of Visual Arts which will highlight some new footage and images shot in India. I look forward to meeting some of you there! Thanks for making this a reality. 

Date: Wednesday, November 2nd, 2011
Time: 7 pm
Venue: 136 West 21st street, Room 418 F

Dear backers, 

After over a month of exhausting, intense and non stop production + shooting I write to you with much glee and excitement. I have freshly returned from Mumbai, India and again with the good wishes of all you backers and the funding we collectively raised, I was able to achieve my goal successfully. The aim for the coming weeks is to slowly unearth 400 gigs of data and include you in on the madness that ensued in India. Firstly, let me announce my collaboration with New York based sicilian filmmaker Roberto Farruggio. 

Roberto who is a well travelled artist, photographer, filmmaker shadowed Darshan for four weeks making several still images and short films of the behind the scenes on this project. Here is more on him on my blog . Many of my stills and movies to come, will be owing to his ardent following. 

So get ready for some exciting updates and material to be shared. In the mean time please let it be known that your rewards are close to being produced and will be mailed out to you very soon!

Sincerely, 
Manjari Sharma