Timeline / August 13, 2020

Home / Timeline / 2020 / August / 13

Album Published August 13, 2020

Blessings (31 new items)

Varanasi is said to be the oldest continuously inhabited city in the world. A site of pilgrimage for thousands of years. It is believed by Hindus that bathing in the river Ganges here results in the remission of sin and facilitates the attainment of salvation. Whether you believe this or not the Ganges guards her mystery perfectly. She left me spell-bound years ago. On her banks, sunrise and sunset are such remarkable 'happenings'. Those magical hours of golden filtered light have the ability to touch so deeply. The mysterious twilight saturated with the dying perfume of the garland, fuses perfectly with devotional chanting and the heavy sigh of water lapping against her banks. Probing into the enigma of this life’s incarnation. These moments are digestive. * To my dear friend Ravi Seth. May your light shine brightly.

Content Published August 13, 2020

Album Published August 13, 2020

Blessing (9 new items)

Visit Travel

Content Published August 13, 2020

Album Published August 13, 2020

Station to Station (1 new item)

As a seasoned guest in this marvellous Indian continent, I still find India a baffling and glorious enigma. India is as vast as it is crowded, as luxurious as it is squalid. Nothing is ever quite the way you expect it to be. What seems an illusion is reality and curiously intoxicating and toxic at the same time. Suffocating bureaucracy thrives and seems to have been a legacy of bygone times and the British in India. Common sense seems to be deficient, on the other hand bountiful portions of buffoonery and chaos thrive and miraculously get processed, detangle and transformed into a sense of order. Perhaps the most triumphant legacy from those "Rule Britannia" days has to be the remarkable railway network. Railways were first introduced to India in 1853. Once established they became a lifeline for trade, economy and people. Approximately 40,000 miles plus of tracks connect millions of lives. The railways traverse the length and width of this vast country bringing near the far. Whole communities live, work and love between the tracks. I have spent weeks in Indian railway stations over the years, endlessly waiting on platforms, feeling filthy, grumpy, dehydrated. Never far from the all pervasive fog of body odour artfully blended with alluring spices from the tiffin boxes and incense. This gallery records everyday life on the tracks in one station over a period of 7 weeks. I grew to love and admire this amazing community of people that dwell in and around this railway station. Sadly, In the last 10 years Indian railways have been digitally transformed and that magical sense of bygone transportation is fading fast.

Album Published August 13, 2020

A wave like no other (19 new items)

Like many people I watched the 2004 Tsunami unfold on the TV. Destruction and immeasurable suffering was served up blow by blow with every news bulletin throughout the day. In hours, life for many had swerved off course in an irrevocable direction of horror. I arrived four weeks later in a coastal region of Tamil Nadu, the area of south India hardest hit by the tsunami. It seemed absurd that just weeks earlier this had been a paradise destination, such was the extent of the damage. My first impression was a total lack of any sensation, a sort of blank space in my thoughts, as I tried to assimilate the unbelievable scale of the devastation. I had hired a small motorbike so I was able to go off road and explore the endless ruined coastline. The ‘wipeout’ extended to every horizon and went on for hours. I rode around in disbelief. The clear blue winter sky seemed to spread such profound sadness above the crushed landscape. I will never forget the quiet dignity, courage and kindness of all those displaced fishing people as they collected their lifetime belongings, often in a single plastic bag. I revisited this fishing community every three months for over a year and watched them rebuild their lives. Every story was truly inspiring and left a lasting impression of hope and the extraordinary resilience of the human spirit. * I would sincerely like to thank the late Gerard Arnhold and my friends for their generosity.

Content Published August 13, 2020

Content Published August 13, 2020

Album Published August 13, 2020

Los Barrios

Cuba is a truly exhilarating country.She is seductive, audacious and ruined to perfection.By this I mean a type of beauty similar to the face of a refined mature lady.A lifetime worth of accumulated beauty.The Cuban people are educated, independent, fun loving and sincerely mischievous. This distinctive amalgam of Latino spirit, relentless hardship and the need to escape from the obligation of their history has shaped the Cubans with a burning spirit. For the majority of Cubans on the lower end of the financial scale life is tough, the price of survival is measured in American dollars. They are constantly being reminded how happy they are under socialism. A growing feeling of discontent has lead to a questioning of the mandatory Marxist indoctrination, a frustrated dream for many.Various political factors have prevented Cuba from being sullied by mass consumer tourism. They are now at a unique tipping point in Cuba's history when everything is about to radically change. Thankfully the energy on the street is beaming with enthusiasm in spite of continually being crushed. La Lucha, is the perfect word in Spanish that describes the sweat and persistent scramble for everyday existence. This theme was vocalised by many on my visits around Cuba. A fifth of Cuban population live in and around Havana. Los Barrios, translated as 'the neighbourhood' is an underprivileged area of Havana where survival is an everyday challenge. In spite of a good education and the free health-care system it’s hard to reconcile these benefits if you can’t make end meet. In the new yet to be born Cuba it seems that daily life is a trial, caught between the old and a draft of the new. I look forward to a future where the creative spirit of the Cuban people will be unleashed to flourish.

Karena Perronet-Miller

Blessings (31 new items)

pano5.jpg

Blessing (9 new items)

071201-45-55.jpg

Station to Station (1 new item)

A wave like no other (19 new items)

58-11.jpg

54-50.jpg

Los Barrios