Beginnings in Bombay, 1998–2003

I have discovered photography. Now I can kill myself. I have nothing else to learn
Pablo Picasso

on photography, 2001


In the beginning was the shadow.

Our first brush with the image. The play of light and the half-light, the beginnings of the art of picture making.

As far back as 360 BC Plato divided the visible world into two spheres or sections. One made up of images, shadows and reflections, and the other section, of which this is only the resemblance, to include the animals we see and everything that grows or is made. Later, he goes on to describe how we gain understanding of the visible world through the perception of images. And then of course is the story of the Corinthian maid, tracing the outline of her lover's shadow to create a perfect reminder of him before he left for an extended period in another country.

Myths apart, ancient Chinese and Greek scholars noted the phenomenon that forms the basis for photography ~ that light passing through a small hole in an enclosed, darkened space generates an image. And it wasn't long before the device that eventually evolved into the camera came into being, allowing European scientists in the 17th and 18th centuries to set out for the unexplored regions, to record and to substantiate their belief, that "to see is to know".

So we see that the development of photography was hardly a giant leap forward, merely the swell of a progress that had begun hundreds of years ago. Plato talked about the perception of images, Leonardo da Vinci experimented with shadow projections on the ceilings of chapels (where else?), Maholy-Nagy put objects directly on light-sensitive paper and then moved them about, others experimented by exposing bitumen-coated glass plates, we all have captured images on light-sensitive film which is then subjected to chemicals, and now photography has gone digital.

Timeless art, married to science over the ages.

And yet there are those who view photography almost as a corruption of art, the modern invention that has the gall to try and achieve recognition as an art form. I can only say that such people don't know their elbows from their posteriors. What is it that is so different about photography? Painters use brushes, sculptors use chisels, photographers use cameras.

Even Degas painted scenes of everyday life in his characteristic and now famous "snapshot technique". The Impressionists, of course, might have made great photographers (just like Ansel Adams would have made a great 19th century artist) since they understood so well the effect of light. Monet would actually work on up to 3 canvasses at the same time, exchanging one for the other when the light changed. Unlike Expressionists like van Gogh, who painted what they felt, Impressionists painted what they saw. Which also fits in with the ideology of the European Enlightenment, wherein knowledge was organized to privilege an observing subject and an external world. The camera was often presented as the defining metaphor for the Enlightenment.

Of course, photographic ideas have come a long way from the days of Ansel Adams. There was modernism, and photography evolved with sharp focus and up-to-date notions of subject matter and treatment. And finally along came post-modernism, and Andy Warhol who used photographs as the basis for paintings. Many photographers were no longer trying to go out and make pictures "from nature" like Adams.

A good photographer need not look for a Taj Mahal. It doesn't require much skill to make a pretty photograph out of a pretty subject. Rather, a brilliant photograph is one that makes art where there was none. That is the challenge of photography.

We look at the same things, yet we see differently. That is what photography is all about. It reminds me of the book "The Little Prince", where people see a hat but the author sees an elephant in a boa constrictor. To me it isn't about technicalities and other obscenities. It isn't about shutter speed and rule of thirds and single lens reflex. It isn't the camera that makes the art ~ it's the man behind it.

Contrary to what people think, a photograph never lies. Things aren't so black and white. If I see an elephant where you see a hat, it merely proves differences in perception, not truth withheld.

Modern artists since the Fauves have seen themselves as autonomous ~ as creators of objects that posses their internal logic and significance. For such artists a work of art is something new in the world, not a mere copy; they may exploit our knowledge of external reality, but they realize no obligations towards it.

This change in outlook was summarized by Matisse himself who said, "I don't paint women. I paint pictures".

I would have to say that I don't shoot people or places. I shoot photographs.

© 2001–2008 p i n a k i