ABOUT
Pretika Menon is a photographer and filmmaker whose work moves between intimacy and observation,
tracing the quiet, complex relationships between people, place, and time. Rooted in a deeply personal gaze,
her images explore memory, matrilineal labor, and the emotional architectures of everyday life.
Over the past 15 years, Menon has developed a distinct visual language — cinematic, tender, and psychologically charged
— recognized through multiple grants and exhibitions. Her ongoing photographic series Dhon, set in Goa, documents
a family of four women and examines the intergenerational legacies of care and resistance in a rapidly modernizing
landscape. The project continues to evolve as a long-term study of female inheritance and temporal change.
Her broader practice includes experimental analog processes such as cyanotypes, gum oil, and albumen printing,
as well as contemporary photography rooted in lived experience — wandering, connection,
and humor. Through her studio, she also produces commercial work and collaborative editorial work.
Menon’s recent foray into film and performance extends her photographic ethos into movement, maintaining
her focus on gesture, atmosphere, and the emotional residue of the real.
Alongside her practice, Pretika is an educator at The Istituto Marangoni, Mumbai, where she teaches
global editorial and fashion photography trends.
She lives and works between Goa and elsewhere.
Her ongoing personal project, ‘Dhon (Two)’, was awardedboth the PhMuseum Women Photographers Grant 2023
and the Umrao Singh Sher-Gil Grant for Photography in 2023.
Her photo essay “Swimming in Plain Sight: A Photo-essay on bodies and swimwear” was published as part of a collective book
“The Postcolonial Sporting Body: Contemporary Indian Investigations” a research into the sociology of sport in contemporary India.
-
She was selected for the Angkor Photo Workshop (Siem Reap, 2024)
-
Selected for a darkroom workshop by Srinivas Kuruganti, funded by the Murthy Nayak Foundation (Delhi, 2021)
-
Participated in a residency funded by Vogue Italia (2022)
-
Featured in Kidz Paris (2022), an art book spotlighting 50 global creatives
-
Featured in Proud South (2023), a global index by Dutch trend forecaster - Lidewij Edelkoort, mapping creative practices in the Global South
SELECT EXHIBITIONS:
-
Dhon photobook dummy, curated by Offset Projects, at Chennai Photo Biennale, 2025
-
Dhon, curated by Goa Familia at Serendipity Arts Festival, Goa, 2024
-
Dhon, curated by Prashant Panjiar at Goa Open Arts Festival, Goa, 2024
-
Archetypes of Freedom, PhotoVogue Festival, Milan, 2023
-
Gundi Studios x Pretika Menon at Method Gallery, Mumbai, 2020
-
Group show at Chennai Photo Biennale, 2013