STIR

An entrepreneur, design enthusiast, theatre artist, actor and singer, for Hardeep anything creative is purely a way of life. A Master of Business Economics by qualification with an analytical research based skill-set, her experience of over two decades adds quantitative and qualitative perspective to the business.

Samta is a London-based design curator, designer and creative director. With an interdisciplinary background that equips her keen perspective on creative cultures, Samta leads content curation and curatorial programming at STIR. Her undergraduate degree specialising in the design of handcrafted objects was followed by 15 years of practice honing skills across lighting designing, marketing and creative entrepreneurship. Samta has an MA in Curating Contemporary Design and is passionate about engaging with issues of social and environmental justice through design and discourse.

Beth Citron is a New York-based curator, writer, and art historian specialising in modern and contemporary South Asian art. She holds a PhD in Art History from the University of Pennsylvania, has been a recipient of an Asian Cultural Council Fellowship, and has recently authored a course on Indian art for MAP Academy. She has curated and published widely in South Asian and global contexts. She is invested in incubating an art writing ecosystem from diverse regions, and fostering a plurality of editorial narratives at STIR.

Cleo Roberts-Komireddi is a London-based art historian, broadcaster, and commentator. She hosts the Art Worlds podcast and writes on contemporary South and Southeast Asian art for leading publications. She is currently writing a book on Indian Art for Yale University Press and has contributed to books by Phaidon and Thames & Hudson, lectured at Sotheby's Institute, Princeton University, University of Cambridge and Royal Asiatic Society, and reported for BBC World Service. She seeks to expand STIR's global and multi-media coverage while cultivating writers in new locales.

Ranjana is an artist, writer and editor. In her work, she explores how people build relationships with other people, ideas, objects and ecologies – what makes us social beings. Recent publications include Body / Language (Take on Art, 2024), which emerged from the Art Writers’ Award 2022 research residency. She edited the award-winning anthology Improvised Futures: Encountering the Body in Performance (Tulika Books/ West Heavens, 2021). She has built projects within institutional contexts, at Dance Dialogues in Mumbai, and later as programmes director at Gati Dance Forum and Bikaner House in New Delhi. She has an active pedagogic practice and has taught at Ambedkar University Delhi and Ashoka University.

Jigyasa looks after marketing alliances and communication, handles search engine optimisation, social media and all digital marketing channels. Her love for numbers and a curiosity for online user experience got her here. With a background in BBM e-banking, she is backed by seven years of work experience with tech companies and start-ups alike. She proudly calls herself a dog mom, a bibliophile and a Jim Morrison fan, in that order.

Simona enjoys making connections with leading brands in the world of architecture and design, and representing some of the most important Italian companies in the industry while helping them get established in the Asian market. She grew up in Italy where art and design are everywhere, and started following her passion of travelling around the world through her work after graduating in law.

From raising funds to crunching numbers, from budgeting to auditing, from cashflow to book keeping, Dilip heads all finance, accounts and legal matters. Company secretary by profession, he has been with the group and its promoters for over 17 years.

Writing, probing and research have been key to Zohra's work at STIR. A formal education in architecture and a fond connection with storytelling brought her here. She believes that the best piece of writing comes out of 'non-action', and for someone as disquiet as her, it's an everyday struggle. A mother of one, she loves travelling and tuning into culture-related podcasts.

Anmol is a writer, editor, and novice academic with over eight years of multidisciplinary experience spanning core and allied disciplines in architecture and design. At STIR, Anmol works to steer the platform’s editorial across the architecture and design verticals, geared towards intertwining theory and praxis, a keen sense of questioning, and responsible journalism in creative disciplines. He has an MA in History and Critical Thinking from the AA School and continues working out of STIR’s London outpost. His academic work and enquiry revolve around housing, post- and decolonial theory, the democracy of access in architecture and design, ideas of labour in the profession, climate justice, and more. Cinema and its relationship to space continue to fascinate him personally.

Aarthi has been a feature writer for over eight years, exploring her deep interest in architecture and design. She aims to engage readers with compelling and thought-provoking stories that inspire conversation. As a Carnatic singer and a Classical pianist, her artistic sensibility informs her writing style. Aarthi loves to pursue out-of-the-box stories that bring new perspectives to traditional design narratives.

In more than half a decade of dedicated writing and research fueled by her education and experience in architecture, Jincy is involved in writing for, ideating as well as aligning and editing content for STIR’s design and architecture verticals. She also edits and oversees the day-to-day editorial operations for its launch platform, STIRpad. Her keen interest in what demands design and creative plurality at large drives her professional pursuits. She often tunes into a variety of media centred especially on maligned women, emotional intelligence, true crime and what we get wrong about history.

An architect by education, Anushka is intrigued by the transformative power of words in translating the mundane into something more (than ordinary). Fuelled by her passion for writing and researching, and guided by her formal education and training, she frequently ventures into the rich space where tangible forms intersect with intangible emotions. Beyond the warm embrace of words, she seeks solace in music and movement.

For Mrinmayee, the act of writing is a matter of words. As a writer, she has been trained to look closely at the words of matter. She believes in the potent magic of storytelling and her work is an exploration of memory and identity, or the literal and figurative spaces we inhabit. When she is not writing, she can be found painting sketches of cats or reading books about books.

Asmita is a writer, editor, and sweet treat enthusiast. In her free time, she’s found hiding behind her emotional support stack of unread books or attempting to understand Felix Mendelssohn’s sheet music for playing the piano. This bio is a work in progress (much like she is).

Harshali works across content, communication and production in the arts, bringing a multifaceted approach to her work. She believes that art communicates through the senses and transcends boundaries. Harshali began her career as an Art Researcher at DAG, followed by a stint at Art Fervour, where she developed content and contributed to research and script development for Art India Education Seasons One and Two. With a Master’s in Ancient Culture and Archaeology from St. Xavier’s, Mumbai, Harshali has spent over three years navigating the art world. At STIR, she brings her passion for art, exceptional communication skills and a keen eye for detail. She has even cultivated a talent for seamlessly converting various time zones to IST.

Kewal is responsible for daily web production and backend edit ops. With nearly two decades of experience in magazine and book publication, he has been working on graphics and art since our inception.

Varun heads the technical team and manages web development, programming and SEO. He is a performance-driven project management professional with more than 13 years of progressive expertise.

As a web application developer, Mandeep enjoys experimenting with new technology and innovative techniques to improve the everyday applications in website management.

As an HTML developer, Gaurav specializes in creating clean, efficient, and responsive web pages to deliver seamless user experiences across all devices.