India cockfights

Nayan Sthankiya is an East Indian photographer raised in Canada. For the last 6+ years he has been based primarily in Asia covering breaking news as well as political, social, cultural and environmental stories on assignment as well as self generated. He has been commissioned and completed assignment throughout the globe. His images strive to engage and inform, encompassing the daily human experience in its environment. Born in Uganda, Africa to East Indian parents, forced to flee during a brutal military dictatorship learning first hand at a very young age the importance of media, the image and it’s role as a witness, its ability to foster dialogue and in that dialogue effect positive change.

He studied multi-media arts at the Alberta College of Art and Design in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. He slowly gravitated away from fine arts to photography after spending a year lobbying the Chinese government for the release of a wrongly imprisoned South Korean photojournalist, Seok Jae-hyun, arrested while documenting North Korean refugee’s in China. He again saw first hand the power of the image to educate, inspire and motivate.

He was asked to undertake disaster missions with the Korean Medical Association to Aceh and Paksitan, receiving a commendation for his work. He also spent time traveling throughout North Korea documenting the Korean Friendship Association. He was Chief video editor producing, shooting and editing, with a team of 10 people, 20, 5min situational ESL videos a month over a 12 month period, shot through-out Daegu, South Korea. Most recently he was in India invited to teach various aspects of photography, photojournalism and multimedia in the hill station town of Ooty in the mountains of Tamil Nadu, India.

His images have appeared in publications world wide, National Geographic Korea, New York Times, L.A. Times, Wall Street Journal Asian Magazine, Financial Times, Asian Geographic, Internazionale, The Guardian, Village Voice, B.B.C., C.S. Monitor, L’espresso, Joongang Ilbo, Korea Times, Financial Times, International Herald Tribune, Financial Times Magazine.