Axis power

What if the world was vertical and all its phenomena perpendicular? An architectural photog embarks on a different plane to indulge in a theory hitherto unexplored

What if the world was vertical and all its phenomena perpendicular? An architectural photog embarks on a different plane to indulge in a theory hitherto unexploredu00a0

"What if the world is so strange that we could never hope to understand it... and science was wasting its time trying to do so." When Stephen Hawking wondered aloud, little did he know his words would strike so hard.

Somewhere amid all the saying, Pallon Daruwala chanced upon that one fascinating finding of the mind, a subject so far slept upon. He pictured himself looking at the earth from a spaceship. Zooming into the people, their buildings, the trees; and conjured images of how everyone would be, quite literally, 'hanging' from it. The earth, to him, looked like a large, round pin-cushion with people, animals and everything else protruding like pins that had been stuck to it. However, every time they were to be asked, they'd swear they were on level ground and facing upwards!

"I came to realise how the one thing we take so much for granted is not the air we breathe, but the flat, horizontal level plane we all live on." So, Pallon decided to rise above, and came up with a series of 36 images in black and white that'd illustrate his imaginary indulgence. Quite ironically, he calls it Vertical Horizon, even as he leaps beyond.

Never heard of Hawking having given anyone such a creative high before.
But that one statement of his triggered me off. I started to ask myself, what is the one thing, which, if, hadn't happened the way it has, would change the complete face of the world, the way we evolved and developed? What if we had a straight line to live on? A linear axis? There are freak phenomena in the world, and this isn't impossible.

You sound Quixotic.
I've just been that way as far as this is concerned. I'm only thinking like a layman. A scientific one. Some stalwarts in the field have said some things that may've at first appeared frivolous or far-fetched, but have gone forward to lead to great discoveries. People read fiction, I read non-fiction. What I'm saying isn't a mere figment of my imagination; it is a combination of both worlds.u00a0

But most of us have stopped seeing the world as a level field. We know it's gol maal in its many vertical spirals.
Hawking talks about perception and relativity with respect to space and time. I might see you, you might see me, but when you and I stand in front of a mirror, you'd see yourself, and I'd see me. If you're up in a spaceship, people on the earth will seem like they're hanging from a tree. You get a grip of the earth from the top and bottom, and stretch it till it's a long line and nothing else. That's the world I'm talking about.

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What happens to gravity, then?
It's just one of the elements that would have acted or reacted differently. Like it would, when something is built upon a mountain cliff.

In your works, you say, you've tilted the axis 90 degrees and 'let nature take its own course.' What led you to this approach, better known as the Wu Wei principle of Taoism?
I do understand the concept of balance in the world. The Yin and the Yang. I'm just scraping the surface, but I know you have to have a complete world; nature wants it that way. If you look at my photographs, they do have that sense of balance. If one of the elements was missing from either side of the axis, I believe that the vertical horizon that we are in a way already living on, could have collapsed. Look at someone sitting in the lotus position of meditation, for instance. Both sides of his body are in perfect equilibrium. The mandalas are another example.

Monotones, they say, depict men of melancholy.
Colours often distract one from the emotion in a picture, so I love working with black and white. They are more expressive than sad. I've done happy pictures galore.

Your art is sharp. Almost piercing. And super symmetrical.
It's more a style than anything else. I find perfection in it. You can find it even in a crushed can of beer, if you know how to. It's like a fashion photographer trying to bring out the sharpness of a model's facial features, at the same time retaining her softness. If you cover one half of any of my frames and turn it horizontally, you will see a certain sense of order. If I was standing somewhere else while shooting it, the order would've been disturbed.

There's a lot of mirror use. You do like to reflect.
It's not the mirror effect that's special here. People have done it to death. But yes, I don't know anyone who's turned the image 90 degrees over after doing the mirror. It did a lot to explain visually the vertical horizon. It can be done in an old-style darkroom, too, but Photoshop is a dry darkroom, devoid of dangerous chemicals.

Architectural photography is a relatively unexplored field in India. How do you think the country can develop a better taste for it?
To develop a taste for anything as such, you need to indulge in it more freely. With an open mind. We need to be able to encourage people to break boundaries and look at things differently. Amazing architectural photography will come with amazing architecture. And it is happening.

What, according to you, is the mark of a good architectural photo-artist?
The power of showing something in a manner so unique that the architect himself stands awestruck at seeing it; he couldn't have possibly thought of such beauty in his own creation. If you can do that, you are successful. Also, a sustained interest in architecture itself is important, apart from a deep design consciousness. Go out there, shoot a lot. Understand what you're doing. Then you can break the rules.

Vertical Horizon
Where: Visual Arts Gallery, India Habitat Centre, Lodhi Road
When: On till October 21
Timings: 10 am to 8 pm

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