Siddhartha Tawadey’s photographs capture the impermanent

When Siddhartha Tawadey sets out with his camera, the intention is not to capture static moments but to look at the movement in nature. “There is constant change and nothing is permanent. If an artist has the freedom to depict this impermanence, then why not a photographer,” says Tawadey. A handful of his images will feature in the exhibition titled ‘Transience—A Photographic Salutation to Impermanency’ that opens at Travancore Art Gallery on November 12.

This draws on the Buddhist concept of Mujo that literally means no permanence and each of the 42x30 inch photographs processed in the darkroom have an abstract finish. The location remains hidden in the attempt to capture movement. If in a photograph taken in Rajasthan the trees flow with the wind, in Dindigul it is the windmills that are in motion.

There are other images that are superimposed. Seagulls from South Maharashtra find place on a Houdini poster and the face of Parvati, an elephant from Meenakshi temple, is merged with its rider. Dragonflies from Chennai find place in a photograph that has a magician entertaining children in a city square in Italy. “The endeavour is not to document. Each image is for the viewer to interpret,” says Tawadey, 35, a former investment banker, who in his debut exhibition in 2008 had explored India and in March 2009 presented triptychs with photographs. The abstract nature of his present work might be unfamiliar to the Indian audience but Tawadey is open to criticism. “I hope the concept works,” he says, smiling, and goes back to his Mac to shortlist images for his next project—a book on bilateral ties between India and Columbia.