SHORT BIO

Indrani Pal-Chaudhuri is a multi-disciplinary artist, filmmaker, innovator, and mobilizer of millions, known for creating transformative, multi-platform works of art and impact. Discovered and mentored by David Bowie and Iman, she shaped the image of Beyonce, Lady Gaga, and 300 other global brands. A Max Mark-Cranbrook Global Peacemaker, she has raised billions of impressions with her work, exploring identity, gender, cultural and ecological regeneration. 

Her work has won over 40 awards including the Tribeca Film Festival Disruptive Innovation Award, CNN Expose Award, and two Cannes Gold Lions. At the United Nations she is a Women's Entrepreneurship Distinguished Fellow, co-convenor of the Science Summit, and co-host of the Global People's Summit. She is a Visiting Lecturer at Princeton, Harvard, Yale, and TEDx speaker, featured on HBO, BBC, CNN, Bravo/NBC, in the New York Times, Vogue, and Vanity Fair, and at the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian, Brooklyn Museum, Center Pompidou Paris, and Lincoln Center.  

She is co-founder of impact organizations Shakti Regeneration Institute, Double Exposure Studios, and Open Origin, and co-leads an X-PRIZE Rainforest Semifinalist team of scientists, engineers, and indigenous forest protectors, developing technologies and bioeconomies for biodiversity regeneration.

Leveraging her expertise in anthropology, diplomacy, celebrity, fashion, music, and marketing, she explores themes of identity, equality, cultural and ecological regeneration, to awaken public consciousness and create a more just, equitable, and regenerative world. 

“I seek to challenge, enthrall and inspire audiences with transformative storytelling, powerful diverse characters, unforgettable imagery, and psycho-social understanding. My approach is as a collaborator, thriving on flexibility and fun to engage the team. My aesthetic is hyperreal, encouraging authenticity and dimensional performances, embracing fantasy sculpting with light, nature, and unconventional compositions. My vision mixes the gritty rawness of my Girl Epidemic with the magical realism of Legend of Lady White Snake for a quixotic, danger and hope-filled dream-scape that reflects the characters’ inner life. To provoke viewers to laugh, cry and to hope, to join our protagonists in finding their own potential and inspire them to transform themselves and humanity.” - Indrani

BIO (LONG VERSION)

Indian-Canadian-British-Jamaican multidisciplinary artist, known mononymously as Indrani, is a “leading director and voice for female empowerment” (Tribeca Film Festival), a photographer, and social justice advocate.   

Known for her “iconic imagery and visionary storytelling” (Huffington Post), exploring avant-garde intertextual surrealism, the Lincoln Center presented her major exhibition "ICONS" describing her work as "Dynamic...at the crossroads of pop culture and critical acclaim." Indrani is also co-founder of Shakti Empowerment Education (SEEschool.org), and a lecturer at Princeton University on "Moving Millions to Action: Art and Film for Human Rights and Social Justice." 

Empowering women and LGBTQ rights, anti-racism, and environmental sustainability, she is an educator and speaker at Harvard University on "Pride and Progress" at the LGBTQ Film Symposium. Indrani is Co-Host of the Global People’s Summit during the General Assembly at the United Nations, democratizing access to conversations and information that shape the world; UN Women’s Entrepreneurship Distinguished Fellow; Host of New York Live Arts - AI Live Ideas Gala; co-Founder and Executive Director of the Shakti Empowerment Education Foundation.

Empowering women and LGBTQ rights, anti-racism, and environmental sustainability, she is an educator and speaker at Harvard University on "Pride and Progress" at the LGBTQ Film Symposium. Indrani is Co-Host of the Global People’s Summit during the General Assembly at the United Nations, democratizing access to conversations and information that shape the world; UN Women’s Entrepreneurship Distinguished Fellow; Host of New York Live Arts - AI Live Ideas Gala; co-Founder and Executive Director of the Shakti Empowerment Education Foundation.

"At the forefront of contemporary photography"  - NOWNESS

While a student of Anthropology at Princeton University, Indrani was discovered and mentored by Iman and David Bowie, who commissioned her first book cover for I am Iman, and her first album art for Heathen, on Bowie's loss of faith in grand narratives after 9/11. Bowie later launched her directorial debut with the music video for his Valentine’s Day, exploring the mind of a high school mass shooter, which was featured in the HBO Movie Bowie: the Last 5 Years.

Indrani has empowered some of the world’s most legendary artists, including helping launch the solo careers of Beyonce and Lady Gaga, creating their debut album art for Dangerously in Love and The Fame (Collector's Edition) respectively. She put celebrities in coffins, including Kim Kardashian, Usher, Serena Williams and Elijah Woods for Digital Death, raising awareness and millions of dollars against AIDS in Africa and India for Keep A Child Alive, and many other projects for social good.

Featured in The New York Times, LA Times, Rolling Stone, Vogue, Vanity Fair and VICE, and published in 23 books, Indrani's work is exhibited in museums including the National Portrait Gallery at the Smithsonian Institute, The Center Pompidou Paris, The Rubin Museum of Art NY, The Victoria & Albert Museum London, The Brooklyn Museum, The Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, The Museum at the Fashion Institute and The Australian Center for the Moving Image.

Her videos have over 70 million views online, and she has created images and commercials for over 300 international brands including Pepsi, Nike, Lancome, and L’Oreal. Regularly interviewed for CNN, HBO, E! News and Showbiz Tonight, she is invited to speak at Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, Centre Pompidou, Princeton, New York University and Harvard University.

EARLY LIFE: Born in Kolkata and raised volunteering with Mother Teresa since a small child, Indrani experienced the power of change that the tiniest of people can bring. Eager to learn from the top artists of the world, she became an international teen model-actor. At 18 she returned for a 6-month solo pilgrimage across India, and co-founded Shakti Empowerment Education, SEEschool.org providing education, vocational training and micro-financing for 300 socio-economically disadvantaged women and children annually in West Bengal. She met classical harpist Markus Klinko and they began their professional photography careers together as the photography duo known as Markus + Indrani.

Indrani received a scholarship to Princeton University, where she reinstated Sanskrit and spearheaded a student movement to create a South Asian Studies Program, founded the Eastern Philosophical Discussion Group, and graduated with a Magna Cum Laude BA in Anthropology, while advancing her photography and digital art career.

SOCIAL JUSTICE ADVOCACY: Working with over 25 NGOs, "Indrani is internationally recognized for her extensive work on social causes... Empowering young girls to become powerful agents of change" (Huffington Post).

"Wildly creative... Indrani changes the fate of forgotten girls... She is fighting to give girls a better future." -Abigail Pesta, The Daily Beast

EDUCATOR AND SPEAKER: United Nations, Harvard University, Princeton University, University of Pennsylvania, New York University, Carnegie Hall, Lincoln Center, and Center Georges Pompidou. SPEAKING ENGAGEMENTS

BRAVO (NBC) DOCU-SERIES DOUBLE EXPOSURE: Indrani was the subject of a 6-part docu-series on US primetime Bravo/ NBC TV. Featuring her creative process, the humor and challenges of working with stars such as Lady Gaga, Kim Kardashian, and Lindsay Lohan, along with designer / creative producer GK Reid and her photographic partner at the time, Markus Klinko. Syndicated to 200 countries.

PUBLICATIONS: The New York Times, Huffington Post, LA Times, London Sunday Times, Vogue, Vanity Fair, Rolling Stone, Harper’s Bazaar, V, Vanity Fair and VICE.

FEATURED ON: CNN, HBO, Access Hollywood, Extra! Inside Edition, E! News, America’s Next Top Model, Larry King Live, VH1’s Short List, Fashion Television, The “It” Factor, CBS, USA Today, and Showbiz Tonight.

CLIENTS: Pepsi, Nike, Barney’s New York, LVMH, Lancome, Elizabeth Arden, MAC, L’Oreal Paris, Shiseido, Pantene, Head & Shoulders Herbal Essences, Remy Martin, Sky Blue, Gucci, Hugo Boss, Wolford, Girard Perregaux, Anna Sui, Baume et Mercier, DeBeers, Epson, Broncolor, Mattel, Hello Kitty, Jaguar  CLIENT LIST

EXHIBITIONS: National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian, The Victor & Albert Museum UK, The Brooklyn Museum, Centre Georges Pompidou Paris, Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, The Lincoln Center, Museum of the Fashion Institute, Rubin Museum of Art, The Australian Center for the Moving Image.