Shruti Ganapathy is moved by an exhibtion of evocative photographs taken in Asia.
Local currency stuffed into the mouth of a holy deity or statue for good luck may be a run of the mill thing for many Asians, yet a photograph of this tradition sets me thinking as to how innovative and full of surprises Asian culture is.
The image is part of Faces of Asia: A Photographic Exhibition by Steve McCurry on show until January 31 2006 at the Gallery at Asia House.
In his coffee-table publication South Southeast Mr. McCurry said: “It is this unbroken continuity with the past and ancient beliefs that still takes me back to Asia, and it’s a quality unique in the world. In the secular West, where nothing is sacred, everything seems hidden; yet in Asia, where nothing is hidden, everything is sacred.”
Personally for me, these pictures are a unique revelation, a host of stories of struggle and triumph. They tell tales of horror, excitement, celebration, comfort and prayer.
A photograph of an old man carrying a ruined sewing machine on his shoulders, wading neck deep in floodwaters is stirring. His machine is broken. He can probably not afford another. The Indian monsoons have taken his only form of livelihood away from him. And yet, I learnt that when the photograph was published, the sewing machine company sent him a replacement.
These pictures say things that words never can. There is a certain sense of surrealism attached to them. They look to be part of a different world - one where I want to be but am not. Where people are content with what they have, although they do not have much. The pictures depict a world where fear is met with courage, poverty with determination and crisis with strength.
And then there is celebration. There is a real sense of togetherness, a connection between all the people and places photographed in the exhibition. There is something exotic about all the daily mundane routines like casting fishing nets in Sri Lanka or haggling prices with a vegetable vendor in India.
A sense of calm and serenity is to be found in a beautiful monolithic rock, which Buddhist monks pray in front of. The whole world seems enveloped in that rock - all of us seem so small compared to its vastness.
The colour combination in every picture enhances its message, giving the pictures a fourth dimension – one of having a feeling of being present right there. Some of the pictures here make me feel as though I was the photographer, looking at the event through the lens and capturing that one moment insignificant and yet very significantly beautiful.
A woman begging for alms with a child in one hand in the rain or that famous cover photograph of the National Geographic depicting a young Afghan woman with bright green eyes speak of nothing but tales of horror and fear. Both bring me closer to experiences in life I hope I never have.
In one of his interviews Steve McCurry said: “Most of my images are grounded in people, and I try to convey what it is like to be that person, a person caught in a broader landscape, that you could call the human condition.”
Having lived in India for the last 18 years, his pictures from India still expose new themes, new dimensions to existing themes and new meanings to the ways of living that I had never given a second thought to while I was there.
Shruti Ganapathy is the 24 Hour Museum Untold London Student Journalist covering heritage and diversity stories in the capital.
