On a trip to India to come up smelling roses and feeling fit, Brazilian Conceicao B Praun emerged from an ayurvedic experience in Kerala with an unexpected insight. She saw what India and the rest of the world leaves on its doorsteps, roadsides, a sore sight that almost everyone acknowledges. Garbage strewn almost everywhere but where it should be ? in the dustbin. Praun decided to do her ?bit? to highlight it by seizing refuse generated by industries, polluted water bodies and the like on film. She has come out with a book titled, The Load and also hosting an exhibition in Mumbai, with the same name, of black and white images of familiar sights ? workers segregating rubbish, water tanks in industries filled with sludge, animals feeding on garbage in dumping grounds, construction debris and many such unpleasant sights.
Clad in a green cotton dress with her coloured tresses left open, Praun is animated and intense while discussing what she describes as ?waste that is generated by us, human beings?. ?We consume so much and set a vicious cycle in motion ? more demand, more production which in turn creates waste by the producers and consumers alike. Our lifestyle is creating an unhealthy and unpleasant reality,? she says. In her passion to uncover and dig deep into rubbish, Praun met up with health inspectors, government officials and garbage collectors and came away unsatisfied for though all agreed it was a ?load?, no one could come up with a remedy.
A professional photographer, the exhibition of pictures is Praun?s maiden attempt at highlighting a social cause. Garbage in Brazil, Praun?s home country, must not have been an uncommon sight? Praun says she chose India by ?coincidence?. ?The situation is the same everywhere in the world. People continue to buy and discard indiscriminately and leave it to the municipality to solve the problem. Many people deal with the mess that we create from the time they are born till the last moment of their lives. For them, it is a heavy load.? Praun is emphatic that she has not shot waste. ?I have shot places and situations that have come about because people have created it by consuming it indiscriminately.? The pictures are stark. ?I could have easily shot them in colour and you would have seen something different. But I deliberately shot in black and white and through an analog camera as it cuts down on waste. The pictures are printed on recycled paper. Even my visiting card is made from recycled paper,? she says.
However Praun is not immune to the consumption pattern. ?I use make-up, love clothes and shoes and own a lot of them,? she confesses. The contradiction in her life and her current work is something she is aware of. ?I try and curb as much as I can. But like every aware and concerned person in the world, I am looking for a solution. I don?t have one.?
The photo exhibition is on at Beyond Gallery till August 22.