Imagery Is Life, In Life & Death

Let me begin by first quoting a statement by Aaron Siskind:

“Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever… it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.”

We are surrounded by imagery in our everyday lives, be it through advertising, media, landscapes or even our own visualisations. There have been a small number of great painters who have made history and created masterpieces that have transcended through time based on their visualisations. Painters can create imagery completely from their imagination whilst photographers tend to use real life as a starting point. They are all meant for one thing: to evoke a feeling or an emotion, which we gain an understanding of by relying on our senses.

As a photographer, I have spent the best part of 17 years (so far) developing an eye, imagination and understanding of how my visualisations can tell a story to evoke an emotion from my photographs.

The ability to evoke an emotion is what makes photography.

Take this image for example. From a literal viewpoint, it shows what looks like to be a man pushing a person in a wheelchair in a garden. It may be cold as the man is wearing a coat and the person in the wheelchair has a blanket and wearing a scarf.  Are they going towards the doors and into the building? Is the man a carer or a relative to the person in the wheelchair? One can ask a lot of questions depending on one’s imagination.

There could be a story behind the image. Perhaps the two people are more connected and a son is selflessly taking his mother for a stroll in the garden. Perhaps she is living the final years of her life.

The truth is, the man is my dutiful father and the elderly lady my dear grandmother who sadly passed away this day exactly one year ago. This is a very personal image where i was blessed to be the author which reminds me of the selfless devotion my father had in taking the utmost care of his mother for over forty years of his life. It also reminds me of the loving grandmother I had who was the pillar of strength for her family. She was born and raised in a simpler time where she developed and shared her wisdom with all the lives she touched. Her beliefs and faith gave her strength and she spent the majority of her life promoting humility through her philanthropic and voluntary service to the community.

This was one of the last images taken of her whilst she was relatively stable and happy before her health took a turn for the worst.

“Death leaves a heartache no one can heal, but love leaves a memory that no one can steal.’ – Richard Puz

It’s hard to forget someone who gave you so much to remember by and this image exemplifies a glimpse of her long-lived journey.

RIP Ms Charan Kaur Bhachu

22.02.2016