Posted 2020-10-31instagrama minute read (About 167 words)

9:36 PM

#KASHMIR: after @vtwingrin asked after a video made in 2004, I ended up gathering a billion CDs and DVDs from my mother’s to look for old material. And found the RAW files from Kashmir that I’ve not touched since I shot them in 2005. I’d been trying to get to Kashmir for over a decade at this point, but was constantly fobbed off my relatives on spurious grounds, until I was finally able to do it myself. And you can understand why they’re fighting over it. It truly has the most staggering natural beauty and photographs barely do it justice, including this one. The place is not especially stable, and YMMV, but it won’t stop me if I ever get a second chance. I don’t know what the poor people of Kashmir ever did to deserve being trapped between three hideous human rights abusers seeking to outdo one another. #india #crown #lineofcontrol

Posted 2020-09-30instagram2 minutes read (About 268 words)

AUNTIE | Wednesday, September 30, 2020

11:03 PM

#AUNTIE: all my late dad’s sisters adored my dad and treated me like a jewel, they showered me with love and affection and kindness. I don’t have favourites, but I knew Babyfoi the best from spending so much time with her. She had a pretty hard life, and my dad and myself were always trying to help and keep a lookout for her. Her late husband, my uncle, was one of dad’s best friends and he gave me my name: Vishal. It means ‘great’ or ‘wide’ or ‘unstoppable’ and I can only lay a clear claim to the last and am unlikely to ever make the second in my lifetime, and aspire to the first posthumously. My awesome Babyfoi passed away yesterday and my family shrinks again. My dad had a massive family, he was one of eleven, and it was truly amazing, in hindsight, to visit and be surrounded by family. I have never, ever, witnessed my entire family of uncles, aunts and cousins all in the same place at the same time, and never will. There’s only 3/11 left. I took this picture in 2001 in the family home in #Pondicherry. The house was gifted to the ashram by my philanthropist grandfather on the proviso that his family would live there. It’s been empty for some time, and will surely revert to the ashram. I hope they make great use of it and restore the life it must have seen back in the 1950s. #family #aunties #india

Posted 2020-07-20instagrama few seconds read (About 95 words)

ATMA | Monday, July 20, 2020

1:02 PM

#ATMA: This is my eldest, and coolest cousin, with my late auntie Chandra on the back of the bike. This is in front of the family house in #Pondicherry. Family legend has it that just after he was born, in 1960, he was given the soul of his recently-deceased uncle, who was killed in a motorcycle accident aged 19. The family says he is just like his uncle. I think I took this picture in 1994, and printed it at the @northlondondarkroom in 2013-ish. #motorcycle #sriaurobindoashram #themother #pondi #india #streetphotography #yashicamat124g

Posted 2020-07-08instagrama few seconds read (About 110 words)

GANGES | Wednesday, July 8, 2020

9:38 PM

#GANGES: #Varanasi is one of my least favourite places in #India, but there were still moments of joy in this town. This river is a law unto itself, a host to the most incredible numbers of antibiotic-resistent bacteria, but surprisingly, they are present from the #Himalayan foothills onwards, rather than your usual suspects in the picture. #Rishikesh is the demarcation line between clean and not-clean, it seems. The river is actually an amazing opportunity for research into bacteria and drug-resistance. Also, we all miss the magical quality of the most vivid film we’ve ever seen, #Fuji #Velvia #rvp50 #velvia50 #nikon

Posted 2020-07-07instagrama few seconds read (About 39 words)

PAPADUM | Tuesday, July 7, 2020

3:56 PM

#PAPADUM: this is where the dough becomes discs, ready to dry. The sheer volume of people doing the producing and consuming is not hidden away, it’s always in your face. #india #2001 #contaxg2

Posted 2020-07-07instagrama few seconds read (About 54 words)

CALCUTTA | Tuesday, July 7, 2020

3:53 PM

#CALCUTTA: this communist-run former capital is surely my favourite #Indian city. We found the people to be staggeringly kind and friendly, as interested in us as we were in them. And it was more functional than ornamental, we could have explored for a year. #city #india #kolkata #contaxg2

Posted 2020-07-07instagrama few seconds read (About 29 words)

SAEEDJAFFREY | Tuesday, July 7, 2020

3:44 PM

#SAEEDJAFFREY: as entertaining as ever, the old devil, when we dropped by his local pub to chat with him twenty years ago. #actor #india

Posted 2019-10-07instagrama few seconds read (About 19 words)

Calcutta | Monday, October 7, 2019

9:41 PM

#Calcutta: a look back through my archives for #citylab in the #market #citylabontheground #india

Posted 2017-12-15instagrama few seconds read (About 63 words)

India | Friday, December 15, 2017

5:05 AM

Women loading salt. The men are at the piles of salt, shovelling it onto the trays for the women to lift and hand to the men on the truck. Women doing all the heavy labour in #India, what a surprise! India and Indian culture is fundamentally sexist and misogynistic, despite women in power and temples to female goddesses.