Alive Even When Not Clicking

The first Prime Minister of India,Jawaharlal Nehru,is known to have been one of Satyan’s favourite subjects. Legendary filmmaker Satyajit Ray was another. But the majority of his photographs are finely captured,insightful moments from the lives of ordinary people. In one taken in Afghanistan,a man,who appears to be a seller of utensils,sits huddled,surrounded by hundreds of kettles and plates. He isn’t looking at the camera. In fact,he seems oblivious of the photographer. In another,a devotee stands at the feet of the statue of Gomateshwara in Shravanabelagola,Karnataka. In this,too,there is no eye contact between the camera and the subject. Yet another is a memorable picture of a smiling schoolboy,taken in the Dakshina Kannada district of Karnataka.

Satyan believed these were the people who mattered. He once famously said: “My people are not the rich and the famous. They are the simple,ordinary folk. They do not hit the headlines,yet my people are people who matter.” And of these ordinary people,he photographed children more than any other group. So much so that after seeing some child studies by him at an exhibition in Delhi,UNICEF began an association with the photographer. Many years later,in 1979,the photographs that resulted from this association were displayed in New York at the public lobby of the United Nations building to commemorate the International Year of the Child,in an exhibition sponsored by the United Nations Children’s Fund.

While Satyan,who always preferred to be called a photojournalist as opposed to a photographer,passed away in 2009,his work lives on. In his lifetime,he published a number of picture books including Exploring Karnataka,German Vignettes,Hampi: The Fabled Capital of the Vijayanagara Empire,In Love with Life—A Journey Through Life in Photographs and in 2005 his memoirs,Alive and Clicking. On September 23,Tasveer Arts opens an exhibition,titled Recorder of Life,Beauty and Truth at the Institute of Contemporary Indian Art (ICIA House),Kala Ghoda. The exhibition will continue in Mumbai until October 1,following which it will travel to Delhi,Ahmedabad and Kolkata over the next eight months.