An international photography meet and exhibition in Kolkata recently revived memories of the city being the earliest cradle of the art. The Photographic Society of Bengal was established way back in 1856
The Second Congress of the International Photography Museum and Gallery Alliance, held along with the International Photographic Art Exhibition, at the Indian Council of Cultural Relations’ Tagore Centre in Kolkata on February 9, 10 and 11, was important for five reasons. First, it brought to the city leading exponents of the art from China, France, Belgium, Greece, the Netherlands and Portugal. IPMGA has 19 member countries, photographs from most which were exhibited, including cases in which the photographers themselves — from Bangladesh, Britain, Slovakia, for example — could not come.
Second, the exhibition showcased the work of a wide-range of Indian photographers before a knowledgeable international group, and enabled the city’s enthusiasts to see works of some of the outstanding photographers of the world. In the process it also focused on the highly skilled and sensitive talent in photography that Kolkata has in abundance. The award for the best photograph exhibited went to Bijoy Chowdhury from Kolkata for his photograph showing a young and old person, presumably conversing. Isabel Corthier of Belgium, received an award for photographs taken in strife-torn and flood devastated South Sudan, while China’s award was for the largest collection of captivating work among the participating countries.
Third, the exhibition as well as the discussions dealt which a development which is changing the character of photography as it was originally understood — precise and faithful representation of reality, which spawned the expression that has almost acquired the trappings of a proverb — “the camera cannot lie”. The new genre is abstract photography in which the photographer comes up with an image which does not represent a specific, commonly recognised object or projects it or a fragment of it in a highly subjective manner, which makes it appear very different from its familiar form. The rationale, as in the case of abstract art, is that the representation conveys the essential meaning behind what is seen or stands its ground aesthetically.
Perhaps one reason why abstract photography is emerging as a distinct genre over a couple of decades or so is that the advent of digital cameras and the techniques of photoshopping have vastly widened the opportunity of taking and processing shots in desired ways over and above the old method of manipulating the exposure. The debate is now in its early stages and it would be interesting to see how it pans out and impacts on the evolution of photography as an art form.
Much, of course, would depend on how a photographer approaches his or her work. Fu Weixin of China made an interesting point when he said that there were two types of photographers — the “hunters” who went around looking for subjects and the “farmer” who carefully planned their shots. While most photographers are a bit of both, it is important to recall Ansel Adam’s statement in his Autobiography. “I cannot command the creative impulse on demand. I never know in advance precisely what I will photograph. I go out into the world and hope I will come across something that imperatively interests me. I am addicted to the found object.” Many, of course, find an object and come back and plan to photograph it. They are the hunters who become farmers.
Meanwhile, it is important to reflect the fourth result of the Congress. The fact of Mala Mukherjee being the chairperson of the Congress as well as the exhibition, her own standing as a photographer, and the striking work of several of women on display — Chandan Dubey, leena Kejriwal, lopamudra Talukdar, Madhuchanda Sen, Neha Bajaj, Smita Barooah Sanyal, Srimoyee Joardar, and Sucheta Das — once again underlined the fact photography had ceased to be a male bastion in India.
Finally, the Congress created a heightened awareness of photography as an art form in Kolkata, and the city’s salience in the country. The exhibits included prints from such all international eminences as Fu Weixin, a philosopher as well as a skilled artist of photography from China; Shahidul Alam from Bangladesh; Isabel Corthier from Belgium; Julio de Matos from Portugal; Pierre Delauney from France; Aristeidis Kontogeorgis from Greece, Mick Williamson of Britain. Also on display were the works of well-known Indians like S Paul, Avinash Pasricha and Dhiraj Paul and Chinmoy Banerjee from Delhi, Mukesh Parpiani from Mumbai, and Sudhir Kasliwal from Jaipur.
All the five are important developments, the last particularly so. Kolkata was perhaps the early cradle of photography in India. The Bombay Photographic Society was formed in 1854 and the first issue of The Journal of the Photographic Society of Bombay was published in 1855. On the other hand, the Photographic Society of Bengal was established in 1856, and the Journal of the Photographic Society of Bengal appeared in the following year. Nevertheless, Thacker & Co in Kolkata (then Calcutta) had publicised a daguerreotype camera in 1840 and a number of photographic studios had mushroomed in the city in the 1840s. Besides, the earliest photographs of the Indian sub-continent were produced in the city.
Early pioneering photographers with studios in Kolkata were Felicio A Beato, Samuel Bourne and John Sache. Nilmadhab Deb’s studio, Bengal Photographers, was established in 1862, and Bourne & Shepherd, which survived a devastating fire some time ago, in 1866. Other contemporary studios included that of Johnston & Hoffman. Early Bengali pioneers were Motilal Nag, SC Sen and S Nasiruddin. The most remembered, however, are Raja Rajendralala Mitra, Upendrakishore Ray Choudhuri and his brother Kulada Ranjan Ray. Rajendralala was a polymath and a towering intellectual presence. Upendrakishore was a writer, composer, violinist, painter and pioneering printing technologist who invented the shaded half-tone bloc which revolutionised the printing of photographs. What is not generally known, however, is that figures like the famous scientist, JC Bose and the industrialist H Bose, were also keen and excellent photographers.
A number of well-known practitioners of the art followed — Parimal Goswami, Shambhu Shaha, Prafulla Mahalanobis, C Guha and, of course, Sunil Janah! Women pioneers included Annapurna Dutta and Debaleena Mazumdar. The ranks of leading photographers today include Arun Ganguly, Alok Mitra, Mala Mukherjee and Nemai Ghosh. Basanta Kumar Birla (yes, the noted industrialist), is a keen photographer. Among the highly talented younger people are Shibnath Basu, Joydeep Mukherjee, Dev Nayak, Bivas Bhattacharjee, Nilanjan Ray and Hiran Mitra.
The congress is liable to give a huge impetus to their creativity besides ones again underlining the immense talent that India possesses in photography.
(The accompanying visual is of photographs that were displayed at the IPMGA’s second congress, in Kolkata. Courtesy: IDBI Bank)
