Arkiv: Indien 2011-12. En reseskildring genom ett projekt om en resa

Abstract

My project is based on a journey to India in the winter of 2011-12. I knew that I wanted to do some sort of travelouge based on my photos from the trip. I also knew I wanted to do some sort of book. How this, the story of my travels in India, would be told and what the theme was going to be, that was more elusive. I started out with the notion of a retelling of the old epic Ramayana and combining this with my travels and the critical perspective of Edward W. Saids Orientalism. This proved to be an impossible equation and I also had to rework my plan to fit the tight timeframe I had. In the end I chose to tell a much more personal story about the memories of my trip. The work raised questions of how much you can manipulate a material and still tell the truth about the reality of things. And if the personal can be made to be of interest to others. The finished version of the book is in the form of an archive for memories and mementos. The common thread throughout the work is the more than four meter long picture representing the journey. The picture is composed of several photographs and in details accordingly true, the whole of the picture is something more like a dream or a memory. Inside there are two more layers, written memories and photographic mementos. The whole thing is set in a romantic mood resembling the heroic travelouges of old times. It´s a play with those orientalist themes in a commentary to the way the west historically have been portaying the east. I wanted the romantic allure but when you look closer it shows a much truer representation of India today. I think that I succeeded well in what I set out to do. I think I found a good balance between true-to-reality and poetic fiction in this work that is a peek into the private memories of a journey through another land.