Houston, Texas, might not be the most obvious site for what is arguably the most significant exhibition of Indian photography to date, but to take seriously the curatorial conceit of the show, perhaps it should be. The FotoFest 2018 Biennial featured some fortyseven artists of Indian origin from around the world. Titled India/Contemporary Photographic and New Media Art, the exhibition showcased the remarkable diversity of personal perspectives while insinuating that there is still a meaningful unity to the experience of Indian cultural history. Spread across several main venues around the city, including three converted warehouses and the Asia Society Texas Center, the show required several visits to take in, not least because the artists’ visions ranged so broadly in subject matter and approach. Although it would be nearly impossible to articulate a single take-away from an exhibition of this breadth, one issue that the work posed insistently, both as individual pieces and taken together, was how high the stakes are for articulating cultural identity of all stripes. In some cases, this concern was explicitly political, and in other cases highly personal. Most of the work in the show, however, expressed a remarkable commitment to exploring issues of cultural belonging, as opposed to, for example, more abstract formal concerns that characterize other photographic traditions. This may, of course, be explained partially by the exhibition’s explicit geocultural framing. However, it also spoke to the increasing urgency of these concerns in an (art) world that is exponentially global—a world in which the possibility for communication is quickly outstripping the constraints of context. The exhibition was cocurated by Sunil Gupta and FotoFest director Steven Evans. Gupta is a photographer, curator, and activist who is well known in India (where he was born) as well as abroad (where he has lived for decades, first in New York, and later in London). Gupta’s track record as an established artist and curator across the continents make him a natural choice for a show of this scale and ambition. His photographic practice has focused on documenting queer communities across the many cities he has called home, and this interest in communities that are in some sense on the margins of society is echoed in many of his curatorial choices throughout the exhibition. He is known as an outspoken advocate for both LGBT issues and HIV awareness. Indeed, it comes as little surprise that artists with strong ethical commitments are well represented in the exhibition’s selection. As a curator, Gupta is largely responsible for having brought early international awareness to the complexity of South Asian contemporary photographic practice. As he outlines in his introduction to the exhibition catalogue, he began curating in the late 1980s and produced influential exhibitions such as Where Three Dreams Cross: 150 Years of Photography from India, Pakistan and Bangladesh (Whitechapel Gallery, London, 2010). As the longestrunning international biennial of photography in the United States, FotoFest provides a significant platform for Gupta’s enduring commitment to broadening the conversation about global contemporary photography with South Asian roots. Gupta and Evans chose to define “contemporary” as works completed in the year 2000 or later. This bold cut-o™ accounted for one of the show’s great strengths: the inclusion of dozens of relatively young and fresh photographic perspectives. Many of the artists included in the exhibition are not well known even in their home country, let alone recognized by international audiences. In having sought out such new voices, the cocurators demonstrated persistent dedication to forging ever-relevant histories and took an important step in broadening a conversation long dominated by a handful of well-known names. This is not to say that the usual suspects were not included in the lineup: many of India’s best-known artists were represented by their forays into photography. However, to put these established names on the walls alongside a much younger generation of artists in positions of equal standing was a strong and generous statement on the curators’ part, and one that brought more complex meaning to all the images in this mammoth show. The handsomely produced, 268-page book that accompanies the exhibition is an important complement to a survey of this size. Gupta’s introduction o™ers a brief history of photography in India and reflects especially on the opening of the genre to diverse voices and modes of experimentation in recent years. His text serves to ground the additional three essays commissioned for the show and written by the Delhi-based critic and curator Gayatri Sinha, the London-based curator Nada Raza, and Zahid R. Chaudhary, a professor in the Princeton University English department whose research has focused on early photographic practice in India. This selection of contributors reflects well the geographical scope of the exhibition, as well as the broad range of aesthetic strategies on display. Sinha’s contribution, “A Fine Line: The Still and Shifting Lens in Contemporary Indian Photography,” begins by addressing photography’s fraught inclusion in the category of art, and goes on to address photography’s engagement with historical and mythological tropes, and its unique ability to allow for ludic self-representation. Most of Sinha’s examples are drawn from the most established artists in the exhibition, but she also discusses lesser-known photographers in the show such as Dhruv Malhotra, Vinit Gupta, Asif Khan, and collaborators Anita Khemka and Imran B. Kokiloo. The diversity of the young artists is in part illuminated by Sinha’s claim that photography is among the first art forms in India that is not bound by the traditional barriers of entry such as caste or association with a guild or family training network. Raza’s essay, “Impersonation, SelfInvention and Memory: Iconicity and Mimesis in South Asian Photography,” focuses on the particularly prevalent trend of staged photography and its relationship to history, fantasy, and the archive. Indeed, this has been one of the most distinctive modes

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世界之家：FotoFest 2018 印度摄影双年展

德克萨斯州休斯顿可能不是迄今为止最重要的印度摄影展的最明显地点，但认真对待展览的策展自负，也许它应该是。FotoFest 2018 双年展展出了来自世界各地的 47 位印度裔艺术家。该展览名为“印度/当代摄影和新媒体艺术”，展示了个人观点的显着多样性，同时暗示印度文化历史的经验仍然存在有意义的统一。该展览分布在城市周围的几个主要场馆，包括三个改建的仓库和亚洲协会德克萨斯中心，需要多次参观才能参加，尤其是因为艺术家的愿景在主题和方法上范围如此广泛。尽管几乎不可能从如此广泛的展览中得出一个结论，但该作品坚持提出的一个问题，无论是作为单个作品还是作为整体作品，都在于表达各种文化身份的风险有多大。在某些情况下，这种担忧显然是政治性的，而在其他情况下则是高度个人化的。然而，展览中的大部分作品都表达了对探索文化归属问题的非凡承诺，而不是例如其他摄影传统所特有的更抽象的形式问题。当然，这可以部分地通过展览明确的地理文化框架来解释。然而，它还谈到了在一个呈指数级全球化的（艺术）世界中，这些问题日益紧迫——在这个世界中，交流的可能性正在迅速超越语境的限制。展览由苏尼尔·古普塔和 FotoFest 导演史蒂文·埃文斯共同策划。古普塔是一位摄影师、策展人和活动家，在印度（他出生的地方）和国外（他在那里生活了几十年，先是在纽约，后来在伦敦）都很有名。古普塔作为跨大陆知名艺术家和策展人的往绩使他成为这种规模和雄心勃勃的展览的自然选择。他的摄影实践专注于记录他称之为家的许多城市的酷儿社区，这种对某种意义上处于社会边缘的社区的兴趣在整个展览中的许多策展选择中得到了呼应。他被称为 LGBT 问题和 HIV 意识的直言不讳的倡导者。事实上，具有强烈道德承诺的艺术家在展览的选择中得到很好的体现也就不足为奇了。作为策展人，古普塔主要负责使国际早期意识到南亚当代摄影实践的复杂性。正如他在展览目录介绍中所概述的那样，他从 1980 年代后期开始策划，并举办了有影响力的展览，例如《三梦交汇处：来自印度、巴基斯坦和孟加拉国的 150 年摄影》（白教堂画廊，伦敦，2010 年）。作为美国历史最悠久的国际摄影双年展，FotoFest 为 Gupta 的持久承诺提供了一个重要的平台，以扩大有关具有南亚根源的全球当代摄影的对话。古普塔和埃文斯选择将“当代”定义为在 2000 年或之后完成的作品。这个大胆的剪辑？？占该节目的一大优势：包含了数十个相对年轻和新鲜的摄影视角。很多参展艺术家在本国都不为人所知，更谈不上国际观众的认可。在寻找这些新声音的过程中，联合策展人表现出对打造永远相关的历史的执着奉献，并在扩大长期由少数知名人士主导的对话方面迈出了重要的一步。这并不是说通常的嫌疑人不包括在阵容中：许多印度最知名的艺术家都曾涉足摄影领域。然而，将这些既定的名字与年轻一代的艺术家并列放在墙上，对策展人来说是一种强烈而慷慨的声明，并且为这场庞大的展览中的所有图像带来了更复杂的含义。随展览一起制作的精美的 268 页书是对这种规模的调查的重要补充。古普塔的介绍介绍了印度摄影的简史，并特别反映了近年来该类型对不同声音和实验模式的开放。他的文字为另外三篇文章奠定了基础，这些文章是由德里评论家兼策展人 Gayatri Sinha、伦敦策展人 Nada Raza 和普林斯顿大学英语系教授 Zahid R. Chaudhary 撰写的。专注于印度的早期摄影实践。这些贡献者的选择很好地反映了展览的地理范围，以及展出的广泛的审美策略。Sinha 的贡献，“A Fine Line: The Still and Shifting Lens in Contemporary Indian Photography”首先解决了摄影在艺术类别中令人担忧的问题，然后继续解决了摄影与历史和神话比喻的关系，以及它独特的允许为嬉戏的自我表现。Sinha 的大部分例子都来自展览中最知名的艺术家，但她也讨论了展览中鲜为人知的摄影师，如 Dhruv Malhotra、Vinit Gupta、Asif Khan，以及合作者 Anita Khemka 和 Imran B. Kokiloo。Sinha 声称摄影是印度最早的艺术形式之一，不受种姓或与行会或家庭培训网络等传统进入壁垒的约束，这在一定程度上说明了年轻艺术家的多样性。拉扎的文章“模仿、自我创造和记忆：南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 但她也讨论了节目中鲜为人知的摄影师，如 Dhruv Malhotra、Vinit Gupta、Asif Khan，以及合作者 Anita Khemka 和 Imran B. Kokiloo。Sinha 声称摄影是印度最早的艺术形式之一，不受种姓或与行会或家庭培训网络等传统进入壁垒的约束，这在一定程度上说明了年轻艺术家的多样性。拉扎的文章“模仿、自我创造和记忆：南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 但她也讨论了节目中鲜为人知的摄影师，如 Dhruv Malhotra、Vinit Gupta、Asif Khan，以及合作者 Anita Khemka 和 Imran B. Kokiloo。Sinha 声称摄影是印度最早的艺术形式之一，不受种姓或与行会或家庭培训网络等传统进入壁垒的约束，这在一定程度上说明了年轻艺术家的多样性。拉扎的文章“模仿、自我创造和记忆：南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 Sinha 声称摄影是印度最早的艺术形式之一，不受种姓或与行会或家庭培训网络等传统进入壁垒的约束，这在一定程度上说明了年轻艺术家的多样性。拉扎的文章“模仿、自我创造和记忆：南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 Sinha 声称摄影是印度最早的艺术形式之一，不受种姓或与行会或家庭培训网络等传统进入壁垒的约束，这在一定程度上说明了年轻艺术家的多样性。拉扎的文章“模仿、自我创造和记忆：南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”，重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一 南亚摄影中的标志性和模仿”，重点关注舞台摄影的特别流行趋势及其与历史、幻想和档案的关系。事实上，这一直是最独特的模式之一