Sunlight gushes through a constricted aperture on a hot noon. f 5.6, 1/500th sec in the first ; f 3.5, 1/250th sec in the latter which is much closer to what the human eye would see. Two different realities, at the same time and the same place! Everything is Maya.
Our eyes see only one visual reality at a time: photography reminds us that there are infinite. By tweaking an aperture's diameter and a shutter's speed we can turn the heat of noon to the darkness of night. Here's a previous post on unlearning light.
These photographs are of a stream near The Valley School on the outskirts of Bangalore. It is hidden beside a steep undulating road the yellow school buses thunder down every morning, spewing smoke on lantenna bushes. Nearby are ashrams offering readymade yoga (with 'No Tresspassing' signs and beedi-sharing watchmen with names like Venkaiah and Subbana and Scotland Yard stitched with green thread on their shabby grey epaulettes). There's one solitary farmer on display, with his fleet of clucking hens and his little square field of ragi- and his most charming missus.
Even the Valley, that liberal place, has put up a checkpost to deal with couples from the city who came there on throbbing motorbikes to speed towards the Big Banyan Tree and make out while monkeys squeaked and gibbered.
(More of my photographs here, on my flickr page )
2 comments:
Scotland Yard?? lol! is this the one near the clinic?
yes i remember...i think now there are some zillions of these ashrams on kanakppura road, even by the mud road
Post a Comment