Picture the grace

We tend to identify Kashmir with terrorism and violence, but there’s a different picture to the state that has been violence-stricken for so many years. Photographer Sumit Dayal in his series, “Wish you live long”, has captured portraits of Kashmir that represent the simplicity of the people there. “I have tried to capture the elegance of its culture, history and people,” says Dayal, whose series is a part of Delhi Photo Festival with the theme “grace”. While speaking at the first edition of the Delhi Photo Festival in 2011, fashion photographer Prabuddha Dasgupta had said, “I want to have a long string of images, held together by grace, because grace is that indefinable, irrational, non-linear word that I am looking for.” Now, when the festival returns in a bigger avatar, the late photographer’s idea has become the theme of the festival. “It’s a tribute to Prabuddha, who defined fashion photography in India,” says Anshika Varma, festival secretary, Nazar Foundation, that is organising the festival along with India Habitat Centre. “The festival has a series of early works by Prabuddha — the iconic black and white images that made him popular both in India and outside,” says Anshika, also highlighting that 2,349 bodies of work from 90 countries were submitted to the Delhi Photo Festival 2013. “This year, the festival has both print and digital works on display. And this time it’s not restricted to just IHC but also has exhibitions at various partner galleries around the city,” she adds. The selection of photographs has been done keeping in mind how beautifully one weaves the theme into one’s series. Like, a series “Amelia’s world and animal affinity”, by US-based photographer Robin Schwartz, captures the life of his daughter Amelia with animals. “My photographs are drawn from real journeys undertaken with my daughter in the interspecies private world. I am driven to depict our relationship with animals in the hope that these moments reverberate. The photographs are not documents, they are evidence of an invented world and the fables we enact in that world,” says Robin, for whom animals and interspecies relationships have always been an important part of his work. “Animals in my photographs are not represented as beastly, noble, or as props to illustrate human life, but as part of our everyday world,” he adds. Also at the festival, photographer Sohrab Hura has put together an exhibition, “The plot” of self-published photography books. “The last edition too had a book exhibition but this time I have brought together those books that photographers have come with on their own. Many photographers are shunning the traditional coffee-table books and are coming up with their own ideas to represent their pictures. This exhibition showcases that,” he says.