10th May 2022
Last week David Balthard returned to our club with some of his Indian prints. He has travelled extensively in India since his first trip in 1998 to Goa and has visited it 14 times so far until, as for many of us, Covid got in the way. With a high death toll in India it is unlikely that David will return in the near future, but he is hoping to “resume normality” sometime next year.
He works in panels of themes which allows in-depth story telling, and that together with his narrative delivers an experience for people attending his presentations. This Tuesday he showed us 7 panels.
He started his presentation with the Kathakali dancers unique to Kerala. A form of Indian classical dance the dancers take 5 years to learn their art which is not only dancing and movements but involves extensive application of make up and specific costumery. I have tried in the past to take images of these dancers myself and it is not at all easy - David took advantage of an invitation to go backstage and was able to capture some additional shots that way, but his ordinary shots were perfection - he doesn't spend ages taking the images and uses available light - but he does plan ahead. I feel very dissatisfied with my images now!
The next selection of images was of brick works located between the Western Ghats and Cochin - the images were taken in 10 minutes (!!!) Again - it is all in the planning. The brick works churn out 1500 bricks per day and the workers receive 300 rupees per day (£4). Putting this into some other perspective there are 300 million below the poverty line and 300 mill above with a lot in the middle. This panel was about portraits and action and it is remarkable how David, in the space of 10 minutes, is able to catch the process of peoples lives - his images feel to me to be very intimate without being intrusive.
The third panel was Gujarat just below Rajasthan and quite a bit further north from Kerala. This panel showed town and country and images of families and colourful dress. David showed images of everyday life such as the gathering of wood, ablutions, cobblers and the collection of water. Oh, and barbers……lots of barbers - David likes those. This panel also had some strong “eco” images of extensive rubbish dumps with people rummaging through - truly disturbing.
We were then shown a mono panel the images of which had been taken during 4 nine hour train trips to Hampi (a village in Central/South India). David calls this panel Seat 52.
Back to Gujarat and to an area called Little Kutch, a desert area and home to “gypsy" families and peanut farms. Beautiful portraits and again David gave us a flavour of the lives of some of the people who live there.
The final panel was from Jaisalmer in Rajasthan where David experienced 3 different religious celebrations - Diwali, Jain and the SunGod procession. This panel contained some extremely colourful images reflecting the colours of Rajasthan and its people.
David does his own printing and the quality of the prints I thought was exceptional - beautiful to look at and interestingly he does not use plug-ins for anything - all work is done in Photoshop, including his black and whites. This is a whole separate skill set.
Last week David Balthard returned to our club with some of his Indian prints. He has travelled extensively in India since his first trip in 1998 to Goa and has visited it 14 times so far until, as for many of us, Covid got in the way. With a high death toll in India it is unlikely that David will return in the near future, but he is hoping to “resume normality” sometime next year.
He works in panels of themes which allows in-depth story telling, and that together with his narrative delivers an experience for people attending his presentations. This Tuesday he showed us 7 panels.
He started his presentation with the Kathakali dancers unique to Kerala. A form of Indian classical dance the dancers take 5 years to learn their art which is not only dancing and movements but involves extensive application of make up and specific costumery. I have tried in the past to take images of these dancers myself and it is not at all easy - David took advantage of an invitation to go backstage and was able to capture some additional shots that way, but his ordinary shots were perfection - he doesn't spend ages taking the images and uses available light - but he does plan ahead. I feel very dissatisfied with my images now!
The next selection of images was of brick works located between the Western Ghats and Cochin - the images were taken in 10 minutes (!!!) Again - it is all in the planning. The brick works churn out 1500 bricks per day and the workers receive 300 rupees per day (£4). Putting this into some other perspective there are 300 million below the poverty line and 300 mill above with a lot in the middle. This panel was about portraits and action and it is remarkable how David, in the space of 10 minutes, is able to catch the process of peoples lives - his images feel to me to be very intimate without being intrusive.
The third panel was Gujarat just below Rajasthan and quite a bit further north from Kerala. This panel showed town and country and images of families and colourful dress. David showed images of everyday life such as the gathering of wood, ablutions, cobblers and the collection of water. Oh, and barbers……lots of barbers - David likes those. This panel also had some strong “eco” images of extensive rubbish dumps with people rummaging through - truly disturbing.
We were then shown a mono panel the images of which had been taken during 4 nine hour train trips to Hampi (a village in Central/South India). David calls this panel Seat 52.
Back to Gujarat and to an area called Little Kutch, a desert area and home to “gypsy" families and peanut farms. Beautiful portraits and again David gave us a flavour of the lives of some of the people who live there.
The final panel was from Jaisalmer in Rajasthan where David experienced 3 different religious celebrations - Diwali, Jain and the SunGod procession. This panel contained some extremely colourful images reflecting the colours of Rajasthan and its people.
David does his own printing and the quality of the prints I thought was exceptional - beautiful to look at and interestingly he does not use plug-ins for anything - all work is done in Photoshop, including his black and whites. This is a whole separate skill set.