This month’s issue of Mondo Arc magazine features some of my work from Dev Diwali Festival in Varanasi. See the story here, or scroll down for the unedited question and answers. Most of these images are made during my annual photography tour to Varanasi, which we conduct in November.
Q: Tell me about the experience of creating the images in Varanasi…how did you chose the subject.
Varanasi has an unseen depth to it, rarely understood by its visitors. During the day, it’s a busy mix of pious pilgrims hoping to earn merit in the other world, businesses that depend on them and tourists who are looking to witness all this. As the night falls, the dimly lit alleys grow quiet and everyone congregates at an explosion of lights at Dasaswamedh Ghat, where the evening ritual of Ganga Aarti is performed by priest swaying torches under floodlit steps leading to the river.
Behind all this is a belief that moves the city and an energy that holds its constructs together. My motive has always been to capture this belief and energy that serves as the city’s foundation. I attempt go behind the faces and their interactions, trying to catch an unseen flow of otherworldly forces that appear define the city’s way of life. The people, the lights and the rituals form manifestations of this internal energy through which I try to represent the ethereal mystery of the city.
This article was written for Terrascape, a travel magazine where I write a monthly column on photography.
One of my long standing wish was to photograph the mendicants in Varanasi. I have been to Varanasi many times in the past, but in all these years, I was apprehensive to approach the sadhus with a camera. I had heard about short-tempered nature of many and was unsure about reaching out to them. I did not wish to photograph people from a distance either. As much as possible, I prefer to make conversations, know about the people I am photographing and keep them comfortable during the shoot. During the last visit, I decided to put my uneasiness aside and make an effort to approach them.
Instead of trying to connect with any mendicant I bump into on the river-front, I planned to meet them at their own residences. Obviously, the first step to doing this was asking permissions. I wasn’t very hopeful with being let in, but decided to try out anyway. To my surprise, the Guruji of one of the largest and well-known river-facing residence of the mendicants gladly consented to our request. Even better, the resident mendicants were happy to oblige to the camera.
I am part of a private community of photography-enthusiasts consisting of people who have travelled with us on photography tours. It is usually abuzz with some interesting images, events or topics of discussion related to photography. In the last week the focus of discussion was on making Black and White images, and the subject of some B&W experiments were images from a recent photography trip to Varanasi. I raised a few thoughts in the discussion, and thought it is worth sharing those points here.
I see a lot of considerations that would have go into making an image BW. Some of them here, according to me –
1. If the colour brings life to an image–it does to many images–it is perhaps best left with colour. Images of shining earthen lamps that create a warm glow, for example..
2. If the colour is a distraction–it often can be in intense portraits and many other situations–perhaps it is best to get rid of it.
3. In many occasions, colour images loose the shine in high-contrast or challenging lighting situations. But as luck would have it, these are situations that work very well for BW images.
4. Making BW is not just desaturating. It requires very careful consideration of available tonalities, colour channels and contrast and subsequently identifying and enhancing the subject/story. A BW image can be really brought to life with good quality processing. And this is the reason why most professionals during BW film days used to develop their own images, to have full control over final results.
And most importantly, it is worth planning your shoot with the end in mind (that is, final processed BW/colour image). This is something that even Ansel Adams had proposed strongly (in shooting BW film).