German photographer Wolfgang Zurborn conducted a workshop in Ahmedabad and Kolkata for Indian photographers who captured life on the streets. He talks to Divya Kaushik about being a roadie
I probably did too much thinking in India. I blame it on the roads, for they were superb.” When American inventor and adventurer Robert Edison Fulton, Jr said that he must not have realised that with these lines he was leaving behind an important clue for photographers of the coming generations to follow. There is no place like streets to discover stories that can be captured in the lens.
These stories — of people, of creatures, of random objects — commonly found on Indian streets filled up a huge space at Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA). The photographs that were displayed during the exhibition titled The Theatre of Real life chronicled the life on Indian streets.
These pictures were taken by Indian photographers who participated in the workshop conducted by German artistic photographer Wolfgang Zurborn during road shows conducted in Kolkata and Ahmedabad. Wolfgang taught Indian photographers the art and science of photography. “I was invited here by the German House for Research and Innovation to conduct workshops and join the ‘Excellence on Tour’ road show. They had an idea to combine science with art and present the two exhibitions together. For me, it was a great opportunity to work with young Indian photographers and help them come up with their own individual views on everyday life in India. The first workshop was one year ago in November in Ahmedabad where most participants were from National Institute of Design. The second was in March in Kolkata,” informed Wolfgang.
He says that street photography was the best way to justify the title of the exhibition. “People think that theatre and real life are contrasting terms. But I think it depends on an opinion and perception. Street is no lesser than a stage, where several stories exist together and sometimes merge,” said Wolfgang and one important lesson that he shared with the participants was that they must group their pictures or select them under a particular theme. “It is the most common mistake that photographers make. They mix all sorts of pictures together just because they think they all are good. But photos should always be in a sequence. They should form a visual narrative. They should be presented with some common thread in mind, so that when put across the viewer, he/she is able to compile a story out of those images,” he shared. Wolfgang has been a “kind of street photographer” but he has not been able to discover something exceptional in Germany in street photography.
“May be because Germany is mostly about conceptual structures,” he reasoned and added, “I like to explore diversity on streets. I want to be dealing with chances and be surprised while on streets. I have been influenced by American street photography and India was the great discovery for me. When I landed in Delhi, I was out with my camera. I just could not walk. It was exciting, chaotic and frightening, too. There were mixed feelings. But after clicking pictures for over two days I have so much that I can come up with a book with that body of work. I may combine that with my pictures taken in Istanbul and come up with a book based on my travels in the East. I like the confluence of cultures in cities like Delhi. Whenever I am visiting next, I would want to visit Mumbai, I have heard a lot about it, villages in different parts of the country and surely South India,” he said.
From the images depictinggully cricket, to the glimpse of bazaar or secluded streets with the remnants of the day’s activities littered all over the place, the photos narrate different stories. Each photo is based on a concept. Wolfgang concluded, “You do not need qualifications or professional training to be a good photographer, you need a vision.”