For more than thirty years, celebrated photographer Harry Gruyaert has crisscrossed India, capturing the people and places of the subcontinent with his camera. This book brings together 150 of these images, many of which have never been seen before.
Harry Gruyaert: India attests to the photographer’s clarity of style: his interest in story, public spaces, and surprising scenes, all punctuated with vibrant colors. From bustling streets in New Delhi or Calcutta, to the modest villages of Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan, and the great religious city of Varanasi, “color must be essential,” Gruyaert says. Transcending stereotypes, these images show some of the many faces of India through Gruyaert’s unparalleled vision.
This collection includes striking images of women in purple saris beating grain, dyers busy at smoky vats, encampments of shepherds preparing for a new day, and other scenes of daily life. In keeping with Gruyaert’s oeuvre, these scenes capture the sensory atmosphere, with subtle chromatic variations, painting a revelatory picture that neither romanticizes nor exoticizes the subject.
Reviews
Gruyaert's India is crowded, vital, nonstop, pulsing with color and texture, and as remote from our tidy Western lives as if the photos had been taken two centuries ago.
— The New York Times Book Review
Contributors
Harry Gruyaert
Author
Harry Gruyaert is a Belgian photographer known for his images of India, Morocco, Egypt, and the west of Ireland, and for his use of color. He is a member of Magnum Photos, and his work has been exhibited widely and won the Kodak Prize.
Jean-Claude Carriere
Text By
Jean-Claude Carrière is a French novelist, screenwriter, actor, and Academy Award honoree. He was a frequent collaborator with Luis Buñuel on the screenplays of the auteur's late films.
