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A Still Journey Through Time

OV Vijayan

1991

The camera cannot lie, there is something final about the lens. But there is also a tiny space between finality and trick-photography, which is the area of narration. Azad’s photography concerns this space, where he tries out, not consciously perhaps, the deconstruction of bland exposures into humanist communication. This is a welcome deviation from the photographic manipulation of reality that happens so often in art photography.

The picture of the resting sex-worker, nothing dramatic, is an example. The pictorial space is dominated by a checkered floor on which the woman sleeps oblivious of her surroundings. There is no attempt to explore the erotic potential, even her face is hidden. Or, the picture of the Khazi teenager, a new initiate with her silent search for compassion.

Azad photographs with patience, he reaches the space of narrative, accomplishing pictures invariably close to the written word. This verbality in no way diminishes the pictorial curiosity and investigation.