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Journalism of Courage
A man on a cycle rides alone, the barren landscape of Tsampa, China, stretching before him; a group of smiling women are framed against a wedge of white light that lights up the mountains; a pavement glistens in the rain. The black and white photographs taken by 31-year-old Vidura Jung Bahadur with his Fuji TX2 rangefinder on his travels in China and Tibet found their way to Bodhi Art Gallery in August last year. The show was a sell-out—one of them sold for close to a lakh rupees—till a few years ago, an unheard of sum for a photographic print.
In November 2006, India’s first photograph gallery, Tasveer, opened in Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Kolkata. Last season, Tasveer held six shows and plans to have another six this year. “The response has been pretty good. It seems that at least with a sizeable section of the younger generation, it is avant garde to collect photographic prints, not canvases,” says Shalini Gupta, who with fellow art connoisseurs Abhishek Poddar and Navin Kishore set up the gallery. “Overseas, photography is now almost a parallel movement. We thought it would be interesting to explore the genre in India,” says Poddar. Their hunch was right.
The boom in the art mart is rubbing off on Indian photography too. As prices of canvases reach astronomical levels, many investors have turned to photographs, which are more accessible and cheaper. While the price of a Souza or a Tyeb Mehta will run into crores, prints of masters like Raghu Rai might come in for just about Rs2.5 lakh to Rs5 lakh. On an average, prints come between Rs20,000 to R 80,000 depending on the quality of the photograph and the fame of the photographer. “Prices in photography are very reasonable. And what you get in exchange is a piece of history,” says Rai. “In another two decades, photography will have the same investment propositions as art,” says Poddar. Many art galleries in India—Visual Art Gallery in India Habitat Centre in Delhi, CIMA Art Gallery in Kolkata, Bodhi Art Gallery in Delhi, Mumbai, New York and Singapore to name a few—are now hosting photography exhibitions.
The impetus has also come from the growing acceptability and interest in Indian photography in international markets. “Museums, galleries and photography festivals outside India have begun presenting Indian photographers at a level that is hard to follow here. Naturally, this has induced art galleries in India to start pushing photography with their buyers,” says Devika Daulet Singh, director of photography, Photoink, an editorial and production agency in New Delhi.
A case in point is the 2007 Recontres d’ Arles festival in France. At one of the world’s most prestigious photo exhibitions, the images from India—by Umrita Sher-gill, Dayanita Singh, Pablo Bartholomew, Sunil Gupta, Siya Singh and Anay Mann—told a powerful story of the chaos of a traditional country thrown into post-modern times.
But does the craft match international standards? Daulet Singh is convinced that Indian photographers are on the right track. “I strongly feel that the content is a strong marker of how photography is evolving. The ‘eternal India’ image is no longer the only way to represent India. Photographers have begun using the medium to address more complex and personal concerns,” she says.
Many artists too are turning to photography as it gets out of the grid of realism. “When you are painting, it’s a subjective vision. The lens is truer in that respect,” says veteran artist Jyoti Bhatt, whose recent retrospective at Delhi Art Gallery had a sizeable amount of photographs.
Delhi-based artist Rameshwar Broota too has played around with digital technology in his maiden photo-exhibition organised by Vadehra Art Gallery and Triveni Kala Sangam last month. Some of his prints went for close to Rs 3 lakh.
But there are pitfalls. “My concern is that when these ‘investments’ mature and when off-loading happens, there will be more prints available in the market and fewer buyers. This situation can affect careers badly, more so the galleries representing those photographers,” says Daulet Singh.
Says Jung Bahadur, “There is an interest but not a great awareness of the potential of the medium. Collectors have suddenly woken up to photography because it is cheaper than canvases. As a photographer it is encouraging but I am also apprehensive that it could lead to art photography being dictated by market trends,”
But the market also holds the hope of support. Corporate interest, in fact, will see the formal launch of the Punj Lloyd Photographic Foundation in New Delhi next month, another exclusive photo gallery that will promote upcoming photographers and deal with photo exhibitions. Insiders say that there are also plans to come up with awards, a photo yearbook with the best photographs of the year and even a biennale in India.
Get set for an open frame.
