The Weight of Wings

Photography, Vivek Kumar

PROJECT STATEMENT:

The Weight of Wings is not about birds. Not entirely. It is about the in-between—where a body is no longer itself yet not quite something else. Blurred flight, feathers melting into sky, edges dissolving into air that refuses to hold them. Freedom—yes—but also the weight of air, the pull of gravity, the memory of stillness.

Each photograph catches a moment too quick for the eye, too uncertain for the mind to name. A wing becomes a streak, a body becomes wind, a shadow becomes light. The birds are there, and not there, the way change itself is—half arrival, half departure.

Change here is not a clean line; it splinters, swirls, folds back on itself. In one frame, the bird seems to escape. In the next, it seems caught in an invisible net. Sometimes the shapes feel like release, sometimes like surrender.

These wings do not simply fly—they morph, vanish, reappear as something new, carrying with them the ache and wonder of becoming. They remind us that transformation is never still, never certain, never without cost. And like us, they are always moving toward an elsewhere they have not yet seen, yet somehow already belong to.

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Vivek Kumar is an award-winning photographer whose training includes an Integrated Photography course from Michigan State University, Seeing Through Photographs by MoMA New York, and Fashion Photography from BHAOF. His work has been exhibited in renowned galleries in Mumbai, New Delhi, and Pune. A Bangiya Kala ARYA Award recipient (2025), he has also served as a jury member for Bar & Bench’s photography competition. Through his blog Creative Genes, he writes on photography, law, and mental health, with features in several magazines.