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India
A vast, visceral complexity. Intoxicating, vibrant, sublime, factious, contrary, riven, joyous, heart breaking, essential.
Between 1988 and 1999, I spent varied periods of time travelling and studying in India. Instantly bitten, the journeying fed attitude, elation, inclination, creative drive and the need for a greater understanding and disparate adventure. A glut of learning and delight was to be had in the raw day to day of such diversity.
The following collages are a condensed, fragmented journal of bus tickets, cinema stubs and photos. In no way do they offer any fullness of events or explain the complexity of such experience, however, they do serve as a personal touch stone to greater memory and gratitude and a resource to other work.
Hue and Routes
88 - 89
The turning wheel to all compass points. Shock,wonder and delight in every fresh mile. Gluttonous for drenching colour; for the new, the bewildering, the never seen.
88-89
Trains, camels and windowless buses into the Rajasthan desert, weeks in devout Pushkar, ambling ghat-side, chillums, sleep in a whitewashed palace turret, long, star lit dinners with a gathering troupe of the travelling. Soon enough scattered to peaks and fields - Shimla, Kerala, Mysore, Kovalam surf, Tamil Nadu. Prison train rolling stock, three day bus rides to find the edges of the huge various land mass.
Journeys by mile, by time slip - the medieval, the Raj-stuck, mud hamlets,
the city rich and the fated rags of the Harijan.
Journeys by mile, by time slip - the medieval, the Raj-stuck, mud hamlets,
the city rich and the fated rags of the Harijan.
93 - 94
One year studying sculpture at Visva Bharati University, Shantiniketan.
Founded by Nobel poet Rabindranath Tagore out in the rural splendour of West Bengal.
A man who exalted soul before form - an animism echoed in the belly of the place, - a sure reverence for man and beast, for crop and blossom, for leaf - for all that breathes.
Founded by Nobel poet Rabindranath Tagore out in the rural splendour of West Bengal.
A man who exalted soul before form - an animism echoed in the belly of the place, - a sure reverence for man and beast, for crop and blossom, for leaf - for all that breathes.
93 - 94
Calcutta (Kolkata). A city sealed in time. Independence from the looting toff came in 1947, large parts of the country, however, had not moved on from Partition - an archaic paper bound administration and infrastructure. Spoken English still tweed-clad, clipped and deferential.
Night, Calcutta street lights - a blur of demi glow and vaguely lit paths. Men hauling rickshaws, barefoot on the midnight tarmacadam, vast numbers bedded down roadside under a black swelter of stars. Hotel interiors retaining the decor, cruet and colonial sway of 1951. Art Deco, a rife survival, the exteriors decaying now in the relentless thrust of heat and rain.
Night, Calcutta street lights - a blur of demi glow and vaguely lit paths. Men hauling rickshaws, barefoot on the midnight tarmacadam, vast numbers bedded down roadside under a black swelter of stars. Hotel interiors retaining the decor, cruet and colonial sway of 1951. Art Deco, a rife survival, the exteriors decaying now in the relentless thrust of heat and rain.
93 - 94
Tagore seeps in, - art history classes under the dark spread of Banyan trees. I have a studio in the Department of Fine Art, Kala Bhavan. Working with wood, clay and stone. Sourcing beeswax out in the villages for casting bronze. Bicycles to points distant and the verdant surrounds of the paddy fields. Some nights supping under far off feni trees, coconut sap turned to hooch - flutes, guitars and a caterwauling.
93 - 94
Kala Bhavan, a new flame. A discovery of kimchi and cronies from all parts.
No TVs, no street lights, no boombox ear bleed - a bucolic, pre-industrial calm.
Night was for rooftops, for multilingual gatherings, moonless walks to distant houses through the dense, sweet scents of all that was in bloom.
No TVs, no street lights, no boombox ear bleed - a bucolic, pre-industrial calm.
Night was for rooftops, for multilingual gatherings, moonless walks to distant houses through the dense, sweet scents of all that was in bloom.
93 - 94
Travels in Autumn. Varanasi, - row boats at night, red pyres along the Ganges. Awoken to dawn ragas and the chants from neighbouring temples.
A train high into the Himalayas, Sikkim and days tramping vertical to a view of Everest and kismet with cliff fall and the tick bites that would claim distant years to come.
A train high into the Himalayas, Sikkim and days tramping vertical to a view of Everest and kismet with cliff fall and the tick bites that would claim distant years to come.
93 94
New Year's in Orissa with Jung He. The long beaches of Pune, the Sun Temple at Konark.
Near Spring and a two day train ride West, we are performers at an international festival in Pune. I read a long poem accompanied by a French tabla player.
Back up into the Himalayas. An Ashram for study, sadhus and a head wrangling. Swimming in the Ganges frigid with snow melt from the river's source a few bends up the mountain.
Near Spring and a two day train ride West, we are performers at an international festival in Pune. I read a long poem accompanied by a French tabla player.
Back up into the Himalayas. An Ashram for study, sadhus and a head wrangling. Swimming in the Ganges frigid with snow melt from the river's source a few bends up the mountain.
93 - 94
The Buddha and Bodhgaya. Rounds of the sacred fig tree, meditative arcs of the supplicant.
Late Spring in Santiniketan, crazy heat - no fan, no a/c, open windows and prayers for any hint of a breeze. Temperatures climbing towards the violent wreckage of the monsoon storms. Fireflies in their thousands lighting the foliage of the unlit paths and lanes of the campus surrounds. Indoors, a nightly blinking of green luminescence from every millimetre perch of the mosquito net.
Late Spring in Santiniketan, crazy heat - no fan, no a/c, open windows and prayers for any hint of a breeze. Temperatures climbing towards the violent wreckage of the monsoon storms. Fireflies in their thousands lighting the foliage of the unlit paths and lanes of the campus surrounds. Indoors, a nightly blinking of green luminescence from every millimetre perch of the mosquito net.
1999
After a long summer in the Saudi desert meet up with Duli in New Delhi.
Eagles, hand stitched trews; shedding hard won Dirham on good food in Connaught Place. Night walks, Hindi musicals in pre-war picture houses, long couches are a rupee extra.
Eagles, hand stitched trews; shedding hard won Dirham on good food in Connaught Place. Night walks, Hindi musicals in pre-war picture houses, long couches are a rupee extra.
1999
A return to Pushkar. We stay in the same white washed palace turret where I had slept 10 years ago.
An age old minstrel playing the same recalled tune of a decade gone. Ghat walks and monkey bites, De Quincey after dark.
Camels and sundown, a circle of drums, throat rot whisky. Nights in the desert.
An age old minstrel playing the same recalled tune of a decade gone. Ghat walks and monkey bites, De Quincey after dark.
Camels and sundown, a circle of drums, throat rot whisky. Nights in the desert.
1999
Animals are such a boon to the travelling soul and sidekick companions to so many Vedic deities.
Picking the foreshadowing ticks from a crippled sand mutt - the little dog who thought he was a cow.
Picking the foreshadowing ticks from a crippled sand mutt - the little dog who thought he was a cow.
Sri Krishna
1999
A flight to Ladakh. Ten minutes up and engine flames - a charcoaled rook and grounds recall.
Leh, although contained within the high Himalayan borders of India is distinctly Tibet as opposed to Delhi. Azure mountain skies, pious, serene. Treks and maroon, stupas before high monastery steps. Duli swims bareback in the churning Indus. Breathless with altitude, overnight hospital oxygen, a butter slick of Tibetan tea. Two days south to Shimla.
Leh, although contained within the high Himalayan borders of India is distinctly Tibet as opposed to Delhi. Azure mountain skies, pious, serene. Treks and maroon, stupas before high monastery steps. Duli swims bareback in the churning Indus. Breathless with altitude, overnight hospital oxygen, a butter slick of Tibetan tea. Two days south to Shimla.
Tridevi
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