Abul Kalam Azad was on an overnight bus from Bangalore to Pondicherry. When the bus halted it was early morning, but still dark. Grabbing his backpack Abul got down and took a room in a nearby hotel. His sleep disturbed, Abul decided to walk down to the beach. Surprisingly, he found the hills instead. Confused and embarrassed to ask for directions, Abul walked till he saw the signpost of Ramana Maharshi’s ashram.
He had got down at Tiruvannamalai, the town which changed his life, career and thought.
It was not the first time Abul was hearing about the town. However, since that first visit, he made several visits to this town. A rolling stone, Abul avers that he is hooked to this town. One of the foremost exponents of art photography whose works have been widely exhibited in India and abroad, Abul is now the director of Project 365, initiated by Ekalokam Trust for Photography (EtP). The project is an ambitious attempt at photo-archiving Tiruvannamalai. Launched on August 15, 2014, the year-long project will have photographers looking at various aspects of this historic town.
“This is a public funded collective photo art project. We intend to document the fast changing culture and lifestyle of the ancient tri-Sangam Tamilakam territory, now usually represented as Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka and parts of Andhra Pradesh. We have selected Tiruvannamalai for the first phase of this documentation. We have around 25 photographers using almost-extinct traditional photography techniques along with modern digital methods to look at various subjects ranging from living spaces, life of shepherds, Ramana Maharshi, to temples, caves, ancient and contemporary fashion, portraits, politics and cinema,” explains Abul on one of his visits to his ‘native’ place, Kochi
In January 2016 the EtP will launch the second phase of the project that will create and preserve photographic visuals of the Sangam era ports of Muziris, Tyndis (Koyilandi) and Korkai (Tuticorin); the third phase of the project will be executed at the entire Cauvery delta. “We have tentatively scheduled the start of the second phase on January 26, 2016. We have called for photographers for the project. It will be a 365-day project involving ten full-time photographers. They will be stationed in three base camps and work out from there. As part of their orientation we plan to travel, all of us together, by road along the East Coast from Kozhikode to Puri. This will get them into the thick of things.”
Documentation of the regular kind, Abul says, does not interest him. Nor does he intend to follow the much-traversed Muziris Heritage Project trail. “It will be a down-to-earth look at aspects which perhaps do not appear to be of significance but are vital for documentation. For example in Chendamangalam my interest may not be the synagogue, I may train my camera on the lifestyle, on the handloom, the mundu etc.”
The need for regionally based, non-commercial art initiatives ideally centred in rural areas was one reason for the formation of EtP. Abul joined hands with Kulanthaivel and Tulsi Swarna Lakshmi (Project Manager) to form this trust. A huge volume of Abul’s works, vintage negatives and prints and invaluable artworks from his personal collection are now part of the trust. “Legendary photographers have contributed a large body of work on Tiruvannamalai. But the years have taken their toll, changes have been rapid. Our mission is to do a visual mapping, a comprehensive documentation of this paradigm moment of change,” says Tulsi.
The photographers work on their chosen subject, usually a continuation of their earlier work or interest, and their work is subjected to quarterly reviews. “Abul gives them basic instructions and lets them free. He does not interfere with their work. What Abul plans is to get the photographs, sift through them, and make the selection. We have plans to organise an exhibition of the photographs and also to move to other parts of the country with it. We have an exhibition space at Tiruvannamalai, ‘Kalai Illam’, where these images will be on show,” adds Tulsi.
‘Photography and Beyond’, a year-long seminar and exhibition series on contemporary photography practices, theatre, music, street theatre performances, poetry recitals, story reading sessions, ‘Arts Outreach’, a travelling exhibition of EtP’s rare photo collection, ‘Mukhamukham’, an interactive session with the photographers of the project are some of the other EtP initiatives.
Abul worked for nearly two decades as a photo-journalist for various newspapers and magazines in India and abroad. He has held numerous exhibitions of his works and is a recipient of the senior fellowship from the Ministry of Culture. Abul founded an art collective ‘Mayalokam’ in Kochi and has organised along with other artists art initiatives like, ‘Encounter’, a contemporary art festival, a sort of precursor to the Biennale.
But Abul has a regret, “the two decades of work for the media certainly gave me the money, enabled me to travel a lot and meet so many great people. But those photographs I took, some of them so rare, no longer belong to me. Apart from some personal prints and negatives those years are lost,” says Abul.
