A group of teenage boys, donning skull caps, sit by the Ganges. The triptych, essentially a set of three panels, manoeuvers this particular frame from various angles and has a story to tell. “‘Hum toh Ganga ma to dekhne aaye hein.’ This is what the boys told me. This incident epitomises the spirit of Varanasi,” says Soumitra Ranade, filmmaker and photographer. The varied frames that he captured, which were later treated as collages, form the visual backdrop of Karadi Tales’ new book, Varsha’s Varanasi. Through his frames, and the way in which they are portrayed, the spiritual city’s many shades and layers come alive.
Varsha’s Varanasi tells the tale of a tour guide’s daughter who is in search of her father to give him the pair of spectacles that he had left behind. Through the narrow alleyways, busy streets filled with cows and the banks of the Ganges she goes, virtually inviting the readers to follow her lead. The story, written by Chitra Soundar, is backed by the photo collages treated extensively by Soumitra.
“When Shobha of Karadi Tales approached me to do this book it was supposed to be illustrated. But Varanasi being what it is, I thought it would be better if it was photographic,” says the artist, adding that he observed the city for the two months that he was there, and let it speak to him before arriving at the frames. As he got familiarised with the city, Soumitra realised that it is a place that “operates on so many levels”, leading him to stray away from plain photographs, towards collages that rightly capture the multiple, parallel narratives of Varanasi. “How does one remain truthful to the many movements, colours, textures and forms? I have used multiple frames to coincide, treated on photoshop by adding different colours and textures to it,” explains Soumitra. He believes that a single image cannot bring out the ambiguities, contradictions and contexts of a particular frame.
The city made him see and feel different emotions, he says. “Varanasi kind of grows on you. Everything that you see around you is mundane. All these routine activities operate on a very metaphysical way. Something that happens at a given time and point, is strangely linked to something else that’s happening somewhere else. Once you get into the rhythm of the city, it’s quite hypnotic.”
The faith the people have on the river is quite mesmerising, according to the filmmaker. The people in the city go about something as routine as washing their clothes in the river, in a spiritual way. “And, you always have to negotiate with the cows,” laughs Soumitra. To him, the tenor of the city lies in how different it is from an urban setting. Pointing to another triptych of his, which shows a man buying kachoris from the shopkeeper and having a candid conversation at the same time, he continues, “This old man, buys kachoris from the shopkeeper every day. They have a very interesting relationship. The customer advises him on his personal life and so on. In the urban setting, everyone is on their own trip.”
After working on this project, Soumitra had a lingering thought that he hadn’t experienced the city in a complete way. This paved the way for his triptychs to form an independent exhibition, titled Varanasi Walk. “My whole way of seeing things is compository — I see everything as a continuous shot. One single image can never capture what one has to say. I see it in motion. The past, the immediate future, all are a part of it.”
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Entertainment> Art / by Gowri S / December 03rd, 2018