A glimpse of India

Mumbai, Varanasi, Gaya, Kolkata

The world’s most populous country, its largest democracy, the birthplace of four major religions and home to 22 officially recognised languages, India is a place of unparalleled complexity and fascination.

I can’t remember coming home from any photography trip quite so exhausted. Extreme poverty is on display, just as is extreme wealth. Holy sites such as Varanasi, Hinduism’s most sacred location for cremations and funeral rites, confront you with life and death. The cities are teeming and for the entirety of the month I was there, the air quality was graded a solid 10: hazardous.

And yet, among the noise, congestion and contradictions, the people are warm, generous and good-humoured.

India is incredibly diverse, endlessly chaotic and impossible to take in all at once. It is a place that demands to be experienced rather than simply observed.

Through this photography series, I’ve tried to capture a fraction of that experience – the tensions between people and place, the energy, colour and vibrancy.