A new exhibition reveals France’s deep-set association with India in the field of photography, signposting practices that have evolved in this visual medium in the country over the last 150 years
Marc Riboud’s On the outskirts of Bombay, 1956 captures men chatting at the ghat. The picture is from the Musée national des arts asiatiques Guimet collection. Pics/Shadab Khan
This writer identifies with a salient quality of travelling exhibitions. Their instinctive toting of stories in a pitaara — traversing multiple cities and neighbourhoods — stands out as a knowing visitor. In clear fleeting moments, the display becomes one with the viewer. Convergence, a panoramic overview of French-influenced photography in India engages onlookers with its mobile pitaara. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (CSMVS) collaborated with the French Institute in India to present the display, the contents of which have been handpicked by Rahaab Allana from The Alkazi Foundation for the Arts.
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Riboud shows Pandit Ravi Shankar playing sitar in front of young musicians, accompanied by drummer Chatur Lal in Delhi in 1956
Marking the last leg of the city museum’s centenary year celebrations, the show spotlights the colonial, modern and postmodern periods of the Subcontinent’s history through the work of French traveller Louis-Théophile Marie Rousselet, French photojournalist Marc Riboud and European creator Edward Miller, among others. Here are a few visual snippets from the exhibition.
Homai Vyarawalla (HV) shows trainee nurses in Bombay in the 1940s enjoying a light moment. The photograph is from the HV Archive of The Alkazi Collection of Photography
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Riboud shoots Satyajit Ray during the shooting of his second movie, Aparajito in 1956
The outdoor panorama welcomes viewers in the area leading up to the Children’s Museum. With the museum in the background, it extends upto the baobab tree that represents the institution’s spirit of partnership
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