20 October 2014
India Through the Lens Exhibition Goes on until 1st November
H.E Shaikha Mai bint Mohammed Al Khalifa yesterday opened the “India Through the Lens” photo exhibition at Bahrain National Museum. The show, scheduled to run until 1st November 2014, is part of festivities marking Year of Art 2014 and Manama Capital of Asian Tourism 2014. The opening ceremony was attended by Indian Ambassador Mohan Kumar, wife Mala Kumar, diplomats, cultural figures and photography art fans.
The Culture Ministry is organizing the exhibition in collaboration with Tasveer foundation. It portrays India through the contrasting oeuvres of four photographers, Jyoti Bhatt, T S Satyan, Maimouna Guerresi and Karen Knor. This exhibition demonstrates the rich history of photography in India and explores the shift in representation from the 20th century to today in how the camera has been used to respond and comment on the country’s unique cultural and aesthetic identity.
T.S. Satyan, who was born in Mysore in (1923-2009), and Jyoti Bhatt (born in 1934) are both Indian documentary photographers. Karen Knorr (born in 1954) and Patrizia Maïmouna Guerresi (born in 1951) are European modern artists specialized in modeling and producing photos.
The 20th century black and white work of Jyotti Batt and T.S. Satyan communicates the life of the Indian populous post-independence - from street scenes to historic events, from the common man to portraits of prominent figures. 35mm film shootings of ordinary people pictured in rural India after Independence are the main stream thinking of both Indian artists.
The 21st century work of Karen Knorr and Maimouna Guerresi delves deeper than this documentary representation of the country, by using staged events, manipulations and constructions to explore the religious, cultural and visual heritage of India, showing how this is communicated in the visual arts in the present day.
Though Bhatt’s investigations into village and tribal designs certainly influenced the motifs he used in his printmaking, Bhatt considers his documentary photographs to be an art form in themselves. His direct and simply composed photographs have become valued on their own merit. What strikes most in his photographs is the great attention to background details. Bhatt avoids the prevalent tendencies to objectify and sentimentalize when photographing rural India. He feels little need for capturing the subject off-guard or unaware; the subjects are fully conscious of the photographer and often stare straight down the camera’s lens. Over five decades, T.S Satyan’s camera has depicted many faces ranging from heads of states, ministers and other highly ranked officials, as well as rich and famous people. He documented India’s history though his lens. Satyan is engaged in a consuming search for human dignity in even the poorest of poor he shoots. Even when he photographed celebrities his lens scouted their simplicity and their human essence. The questions that his many ordinary characters may throw at you about the paradoxes of life can never be captured in an intelligent caption-phrase.
