This is a collection of photos from real life moments

Satish Kumar He did nothing but document his life in India with an analog camera for fifteen years. Filming began in his teens, and the series also follows how a young boy leaves his home, which is also referred to as the ancient city of a thousand temples. Kanchipuramand to a metropolis of seven million, to Chennai is moving. His series is distinctive in that his photographs do not show notable events or milestones in life, but rather translate seemingly insignificant everyday experiences into visual language.

The uncle of the Indian boy, Ramesh, grew up with him in a family in Kanchipuram, South India, who later, when he moved to Bangalore in 1997, opened a photography studio, and Satish Kumar spent his school holidays here, or rather in this photography studio. For the teen, the studio darkroom was a magical place, filled with exciting things, the smell of chemicals, and pictures slowly emerging in the looming light. But he also remembers the way the flash lights flickered sharply in the studio and the distinctive sound of the discharges. The work was carried out in the studio: most of the portraits and wedding photos were taken, but the mysterious magic of analog photography captivated the teenage boy for life.

Ramesh, the uncle, visited his adoptive parents once a year with gifts, and on one occasion brought a camera to the family. On the other hand, he gave the boy a cricket bat, because he was still interested in sports and photography, but in the end, after school, he chose photography. He definitely had to move to a bigger city to continue his education and earn a living, and his father only asked him not to become an engineer, so he enrolled in a photography and visual communication course in Chennai.

Life in the big city was quite stifling for a country boy, and it was going at a slower pace. To catch his breath, he regularly returns to his hometown, spending his free time with his childhood friends. In the photographs taken since the move, the city has not only become the hero, but a torrent of emotional projections and colorful results that cannot be replaced by words in the photographs.

Images of life in the hurried and rushed urban environment could not answer the imperfection and emotions we experience there, perhaps even loneliness. Showing the absence of family and friends brought back a lot of childhood memories, while there are also obvious metaphors, such as the image of the family traveling on a motorbike, which means leaving home. We can also look at other images with this in mind, but it is not really important to translate this joyful love of life into words, it is worth looking at the dream-like images as much as poetry.

Action Town Boy is a collection of ordinary moments taken from the flow of time, sensitively reacting to the rhythm of everyday life in South India. Capturing the movement of life – back to nature and roots – was a way for the author to accept the sudden change of environment in his life. He believes that the world is a chain reaction of chain reactions and that each piece of life affects the other, like the effect of a butterfly. To capture this flow, a simple film camera and the fact that you always take it with you everywhere are enough.

There is intentionally no artificial construct behind the striking visual language. It was not planned what kind of pictures would be needed in the future, or why and where we would go to take pictures. The photos are actually personal and emotional. It captures what you want to remember, the way you see it. The moment one lives in is the most important, and feels that analog photography is the best way to communicate that. The Town Boy series was not built consciously either, it brought it to life so that hundreds of collected photos can begin to communicate outside and successfully operate in the photographic world after sorting.

Satish Kumar A serendipity arles The winner of a scholarship in 2020, this year was able to participate in the Arles Photography Festival. The serendipity arts and the Rencontres d’Arles Cooperation to promote French-Indian cultural relations. The scholarship is for South Asian photography, video and new media for young artists from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka, and the initiative behind the Institut Français in India. The jury received hundreds of applications, and the winner will receive a grant equivalent to 15,000 euros.