Sikder Ahmed: From aviator to bird’s-eye photographer
After a 20 year stint in the aviation sector as a fighter pilot, captain of business jet aircrafts and CEO of an airline, Sikder Mesbahuddin Ahmed has become one of the most recognised photographers from Bangladesh in the last few years
At 55 years old, Sikder Ahmed is living proof that artistic success and a long corporate career do not have to be at odds with each other.
Over the past three years, a relatively short period of time in the fine arts scene, Sikder Ahmed has become one of most recognised photographers from Bangladesh.
He has attained so many awards, both domestic and international, that listing them would constitute quite a long task as it reaches over a hundred.
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He achieved all this after a 20 year stint in the aviation sector, as a fighter pilot, captain of business jet aircrafts and CEO of an airline, Beximco Aviation.
It should come as no surprise to anyone that Sikder Mesbahuddin Ahmed was an overachiever from a very young age.
"Since the days of my youth, I have always had passion towards creativity and the act of taking a new perspective on things most people take for granted," said Ahmed.
His photographs of chilli production in Sariakandi, Bogura showing a group of women sorting sun-dried red chillies in midday heat via a drone encapsulates that artistic trait perfectly. It is a prime example of how his work toes the line between fine art and photojournalism simultaneously.
When asked about his youth, he recounted, "I started to do my own science fair alongside the kids in my neighbourhood when I was 12 years old. By the time I was 13, I had my own sports club. I love to take on challenges and ended up being a fighter pilot."
Sikder is simply one of those people that set their mind on something and get it done.
Just from listening to his anecdotes about himself it becomes very apparent that he approaches everything with militaristic discipline and focus.
And judging by his own words, it seems he had that mindset long before joining the Bangladesh Air Force, which he did after graduating from the University of Rajshahi in 1987, where he majored in aeronautical engineering.
Later on he became a business jet pilot for a South Korean company, which gave him an opportunity to travel to more than 150 destinations across the world.
He started photography when he was 21 years old but then became serious about the craft when he moved to the civilian sector and graduated from a few photography courses in 2010 with the Bangladesh Photographic Society.
All those destinations afforded him the opportunity to experience a multitude of towns, cultures and people. That is, according to him, how his love affair with photography started.
He approaches his photography with the same fervour he pours into everything else.
When asked about why he made just a huge shift in career paths, he simply replied, "I believe it to be an amazing profession where you have a large breadth of freedom in the work itself. It allows you to bring out the inner beauty of things and engage in continuous self-improvement due to its subjective and artistic nature."
He added, "It allows people to behold the majesty of mother nature, to empathise with hard working people who are mostly marginalised, see for themselves the harsh reality of environmental impact and revel in the full spectrum of colours in God's creation."
The former captain also asserts that capturing the progress of civilisation is one thing that is best suited to photographers.
A consummate traveller both by profession and nature, his travels instilled in him a great appreciation for the planet and its people.
His core drive of wanting to capture photos is a direct result of his experiences in far flung places of the planet, and his infatuation with composition and colours.
To that end, he said "I have always been attracted to colours, nature, unique angles, and the interplay between light and shade. One has to be very creative to bring out the best of what they see by utilising the natural light source and picking the most impactful angle."
Sikder Ahmed's earliest exhibitions were in New York and Bangladesh for which he received a lot of praise and some feedback, not bad for someone who just broke into the arts and is currently doing far better than people who have been in the field for far longer.
His core principle of continuous self-improvement is perfectly encapsulated by virtue of the fact that he does not really languish in the praise that he is due.
Ahmed chooses to focus more on the feedback rather than the praise. "I do not worry about output that much, I know that I am doing the work to the best of my ability," he said regarding the critical response to his work, adding, "if the input is good and I am taking it in properly, my output will measure up by itself."
Ahmed's attitude towards exhibitions is that of someone learning about the craft and his engagement with critics and peers alike, in his own exhibitions, is almost completely about the exchange of ideas and discussions about the art of photography itself.
Sikder is not just famed for his aesthetic sense and ability to cast any subject into a cinematic composition, like all great artists, he has something to say.
"My focus is mainly on colour and the happiness of people. Through my photography you will see the hard working men and women captured in the most colourful way possible. I want people to be able to immerse themselves and feel a deep resonance when they see my photography. It can be dried red chilli, rice mill workers or fishing," he said.
This humanist angle of his personality greatly informs and enhances the quality of his pictures, and has netted him a vast number of publications and exhibitions.
This particular bent is what allows him to be a photojournalist held in high regard alongside being a darling for photography associations and exhibitions around the world.
When it comes to his future plans, Sikder Ahmed asserts that he has completely moved into the realm of photography and all that it entails.
At the time of this interview, he was concurrently doing three high-level jobs and in all likelihood has not even heard of the term 'overworking' because he nonchalantly mentioned usually having 16 hour work days.
Sikder's next destination is to do more photographic work pertaining to the environment and the impact of climate change. One of the snaps he is proudest of depicts a farmer ploughing a barren field.
"The northern parts of Bangladesh suffer a lot during the dry months," said Sikder Ahmed, adding, "Families of the farmers move to these parts and get a lump sum payment once a year. Every member of the family works the fields and they live very harsh lives under brutal conditions."
The fact that he has this much insight into the lives of his subjects provides a clear window for us to judge how he became so good so fast; he is a student of the human condition and will continue to reveal and document people's interaction with nature by improving his own proficiency in the artform.
Sikder Ahmed has won three gold medals within the last two months and six others just in 2022.
He has been exalted and awarded the highest honours by the International Federation of Photographic Art (FIAP), International Salon New York (ISNY) and the 5th international circular of photography among many, many more accolades.
You can find his work on ahmedsikder.com and follow him @ahmedsikder on Instagram and find out for yourself why he is one of the most vaunted photographers of the last few years.
