Text and photos by Madhur Dhingra.

This photo essay is a very personal journey of mine. The quest started very early in my childhood. I clearly remember buying my first book on Buddhist philosophy at the age of sixteen. This search has continued till date. I come from a family which has been fairly religious all through. In our house Aarti (A Hindu prayer ritual with butter lamps & devotional songs) was performed regularly both morning and evening by my grandfather. This practice was continued by my father all through his life.

© Madhur Dhingra
Dawn at Shivling Peak- Tapovan-Garhwal- Indian Himalayas. The first night en route to Tapvan I stayed at the Lal Baba ashram at Gaumukh. I was provided with meals and hot refreshing tea by the ashram authorities free of cost. The conditions were very severe and night temperatures went down to -6 To - 8 degrees with snow all around. I had reached early, in the first week of April, the snows had not melted yet. In this image one can easily see the knee deep snow conditions at Tapovan. Shiving Parbat is a photographer's delight and one gets to view this peak right from the base to the very top from Tapovan.
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I have never been religious in the orthodox sense. My search has always been more spiritual in nature. The medium through which I began my quest was a camera. I must state here that I have always equated light with God. I am of firm conviction that the darkness of the human soul, (represented as black in my images) finally becomes alive by the play of light (God) on it. This play of light and shade you will notice all through in this photo essay.

© Madhur Dhingra
Zanskar- Ladakh-India. This image was taken while travelling somewhere in the Zanskar region. The sun had set and evening winds were blowing strong, bellowing and raising the sand as they blew along. I saw this old Buddhist monk returning home with his yak in tow. One of my favourite images this one because somehow relate myself to the intense loneliness in this image.
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Initially I started wandering in the Himalayas. This wandering first took me to places like Tapovan and Nandanvan in the Gangotri region of Garhwal. Camera in hand I saw God standing right in front of me in the form of these beautiful mountains. The play of light on this majestic abode of Shiva (Lord of Creation & Destruction) was an ethereal sight.

© Madhur Dhingra
Somewhere in Leh- Ladakh - India. This image was shot by me inside an unnamed monastery in Ladakh. Many of these monasteries are centuries old. There is a beautiful calm prevailing inside them. I used to sit inside them for hours, watching light filter in through doors and windows. The occasional eco of the prayer gong would seep deep inside my soul.
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My wanderings now took me to Ladakh & Zanskar regions again in the Indian Himalayas and also the land of Dalai Lama. I was mesmerised by the landscape, monasteries and people of Ladakh. The quiet prevailing inside these monasteries which are centuries old, acted as balm on my taught nerves. Light filtering in from the windows and doors was indeed beautiful. There was an embedded laziness prevailing in the atmosphere. Everyone and everything seemed so relaxed and poised. I would sit inside these monasteries for hours at a stretch soothing my distraught mind. I would watch quietly people go in and out of these temples. Occasionally someone would sound the prayer gong and its echo would seep deep inside my soul. Through my images I have tried to bring back to you the beauty, serenity and peace I found there.

© Madhur Dhingra
On route from Kargil to Padam(Zanskar-Ladakh-India). While travelling from Kargil to Padam. I saw this family sitting on the roadside. Penniless and tattered but happy.
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My next visits were to Banaras (also known Varanasi or by the ancient name of Kashi). Now this was going to be an experience that will remain with me for the rest of my life. Banaras is one of the oldest living cities of the world. Mark Twain the English author once wrote” Banaras is older than history, older than tradition, even older than legend and looks twice as old as all of them put together”. I would get up very early in the morning much before daybreak and go and sit on the banks of Dashashwamedh Ghat. Activities on these ghats would start that early too. Sitting there I watched sadhus, pujaris, devotes, pilgrims take their morning dip in the river Ganga. The morning Arti reminded me over and again of the Aarti that my grandfather and father used to perform at our home. Those fading memories suddenly had become alive.

© Madhur Dhingra
Haridwar - Uttara Khund- India. The year 1998 brought about Purn Kumbh the largest of all Hindu congregations. The word Kumbh denotes the shape like that of a pot or pitcher. Kumbh signifies Creation or Shrishti. ‘Shrishti’ or the creation is of the shape of a pot. Kumbh or Creation is eternal, the form may have been different before. there were hutments built for sadhus in general by the kumbh authorities across the river bed. I would visit those and sit with some "real" sanyasis , listen to their discourses and hear them sing bhajans(devotional songs). this was a very nice and peaceful experience.
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The ghats of Kashi are a riot of colour and activity. People from all over India come to these ghats to perform rituals, in such colourful attires. On the other hand I saw sadhus, sanyasis, pujaris and widows dressed in spotless pure white clothings. This mixture of colour and pure white in their attires was enchanting. Small temples can be seen in hundreds all along these ghats. I would sit inside these temples waiting for my chance to get my perfect shot. Nowhere in all my travels up till now have I found light as beautiful as in Banaras. I will not hesitate for a moment to call it divine. Rituals right from the birth of a child, mundan (first hair removal ceremony of a newborn), marriage, birthdays, anniversary death, and also later to perform rites for their safe passage to heaven, all are being performed on these very banks for centuries.

© Madhur Dhingra
Haridwar - Uttara Khund- India. One day while spending some time with these sanyasis in the Kumbh ,I saw this young energetic sanyasi performing some Tantric rites. I stood there watching him perform for quite some time. His concentration was total.
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In the meantime the Purn Kumbh (the largest Hindu congregation held every 12 years) was on at Haridwar. This again has become a very interesting event to relate. I was aghast to see the completely naked so called Naga sadhus, storming the streets of Haridwar. It was here I came to know from the local inhabitants of Haridwar that this whole show was a complete farce. Most of these so called ascetics only stormed the streets during the Kumbh and neither did they live in the remoteness of the Himalayas leading a renounced life. On the contrary they lived in air conditioned lavishly furnished Akharas (Akhara means literally the “place for practice for the protection of Hindu religion”) in Haridwar itself. They were a weird sight. Here in Haridwar I saw them fight pitched battles with the police a day before the main procession was to start. Downright criminals to the very core most of them.

© Madhur Dhingra
Dashashwamedh Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. This beautiful image I captured on one of the ghats of banaras. i would get up early in the morning and go and sit inside these small temples spread in hundreds all along the ghats .people would come and go, oblivious of me sitting in one dark corner with a camera.
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On the day of the main procession I got up early in the morning and positioned myself on the roof top of a house near the Niranjani Akhara(Niranjani is one of the prominent Akharas in Haridwar). This was very early in the morning and I was testing the auto focus of my telephoto 300mm canon lens when I saw a group of Nagas in gathered in the Akhara compound. I was taken aback when I saw one Naga fiddling with the genitals of the other Naga, “and I took the shot” (later to appear on the first page of the Indian Express Daily). Promiscuity is commonplace with these so called Naga sadhus.

© Madhur Dhingra
Dashashwamedh Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. The ghats of Kashi are a riot of colour and activity. People from all over India come to these ghats to perform rituals, in such colourful attires.Rituals right from the birth of a child, mundan (first hair removal ceremony of a newborn), marriage, birthdays, anniversary death, and also later to perform rites for their safe passage to heaven, all are being performed on these very banks for centuries.
Please visit A quest for the eternal, by Madhur Dhingra for the full size image.

There were hutments built for all visiting sadhus in general by the Kumbh authorities across the river bed of the Ganges. I would visit those and sit with some real sanyasis, listen to their discourses and hear them sing Bhajans (devotional songs). This was a very nice and spiritual experience.

© Madhur Dhingra
Dashashwamedh Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. These two brothers had come to the dashashvamedh ghat after performing the final rites of their father at manikarnika ghat. it is believed by the hindus that a dip in the ganga purifies them of all sins committed during their passage of life.
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Now a special reference to the Manikarnika Ghat “The Burning Ghat”is needed. People from all over India come to Kashi (ancient name of Banaras) to cremate their dead at Manikarnika. It is believed by Hindus that a cremation at Manikarnika Ghat gives the human soul an unhindered passage to heaven. Pyres are being lit here continuously without getting extinguished for the last 3000 years. But it was on this burning Ghat that my worst nightmare was to begin. I would visit this Ghat daily looking at the activities. It was not very long before I realised that whenever a body of a poor person would come in, it would be cremated in a bizarre manner.

© Madhur Dhingra
Manikarnika Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. People from all over India come to Kashi (ancient name of Banaras) to cremate their dead at Manikarnika. It is believed by Hindus that a cremation at Manikarnika Ghat gives the human soul an unhindered passage to heaven. Pyres are being lit here continuously without getting extinguished for the last 3000 years. This image shows the continuous gloom prevailing over Manikarnika Ghat.
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It required two ‘muns’ of wood at the least (mun is an Indian measure of weight equivalent to 20 kgs) to cover a human body completely for cremation. But the persons accompanying the dead body did not have that much money in their pocket. So only that much wood was purchased in which only the torso could be covered by wood. The legs and head were left hanging out and the pyre lit. The head would get burnt in a horrific manner with the head and feet falling away from the torso partially burnt. Then these torn away parts were picked up and put into the pyre or thrown into the Ganges. It was literally making a bar-be-queue of the mortal remains . This whole sequence was so bizarre that I decided to get it on film and show it to the world. Man really was meeting his god in Kashi in a very bizarre manner. Tantriks (Aghoris) also hound this Ghat eating human flesh and making love to a dead woman on a full moon night.

© Madhur Dhingra
Manikarnika Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. The beautiful morning light of Banaras is equally kind to both living and dead. I visited the manikarnika ghat one early morning to find it more busy than usual. The light filtering in from the rising smoke and ashes was both beautiful and eerie.
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One interesting image I shot here is of some dogs copulating right on where the pyres were being burnt. I saw the eyes of the people more interested in watching the dogs copulating and found them giggling, whereas right in front of them burnt the pyre of somebody very close to them. Hedonism co-existed strongly amidst death.

© Madhur Dhingra
Manikarnika Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. This was a chance image while I roamed around the Manikarnika. According to Hindu tradition, people who die under unnatural conditions like a snake bite or accidents, sanyasis & infants, their bodies are not burnt but are given a water burial .I saw this lonely body on the banks of Ganga with nobody visible in sight. A herd of buffalos had gathered all around it as if waiting to take the body away. Incidently the vahan (vehicle) of Yamraj (Lord of Death ) is a buffalo.
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My final image is of a lonesome skull lying amidst blue burnt wood and ashes, staring right into the eyes of the onlooker, as if asking some unanswered questions. All hopes ambitions fears loves hates affections had died down into a cold blue colour. “Man had finally met his god”?

For more photos and story please visit Madhur Dhingra website.

© Madhur Dhingra
Manikarnika Ghat-Varanasi (Banaras)-India. This final image is of a lonesome skull lying amidst blue burnt wood and ashes, staring right into the eyes of the onlooker, as if asking some unanswered questions. all hopes ambitions fears loves hates affections had died down into a cold blue colour.
Please visit A quest for the eternal, by Madhur Dhingra for the full size image.

Text and photos by Alberto Maserin.

Coming from an Italian background, Catholicism has always played a very important part in my culture and daily life. From a very early age I was involved with my local parish and going to afternoon catechism classes to prepare for my First Communion.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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I remember that the local priest use to let us play football before the class started to keep us interested and stop us going crazy. Other times he used to show us some of the latest movies. We were just a gang of very chaotic youths, like anybody between the ages of 7 and 10. We were kids with a low attention span and full of energy that wanted just to play and have fun; but having to follow the rules and behave while we were doing the altar service was difficult for us.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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Inside the church before mass you could hear the buzz of people chatting all around, kids laughing, the noise of footsteps as people came in . . . and then all noise suddenly stopped at the sound of the bell which announced the priest’s arrival.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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At that point in time you could feel the crowd become quite reverential towards the man in the vestments who stepped upon the altar. Once he put on those bright vestments and stood on the altar then he becomes something different than he was before. Catholic teaching says that the priest becomes a vessel of Christ and only he has the power to transform the host and wine into the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ through the process of transubstantiation during the mass.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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It was difficult to say what made us behave, maybe it was the respect we felt on the altar and the idea that something mysterious was happening in front of us that meant the priest had to dress in such unusual clothes. It was always very impressive to see the mass from the altar and watch the priest and the congregation as they performed the rituals of the mass. Anyhow at the end of each mass there was a free copy of a comic magazine for us as a reward for behaving!

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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When I grew up and became a teenager I kept going to mass regularly with my local Scout association where most of our activities were associated with religion and we met a lot of different priests who were part of different religious orders. We had a laugh with them, played games and sometime ate lunch with them. The Sunday mass was an important part of the scout life. Even when I didn’t have to go to the scouts on a Sunday, I used to go to mass because all my friends were there and sometimes you could chat to a local girl you liked.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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On its own a symbol can be meaningless but when it is located within a specific context it can acquire an awesome power. So when the priest puts on his vestments, who he was before the mass, all his individuality and personality, disappears. He is transformed into somebody that could have stepped right out of the middle-ages. It’s like he travels back in time to a different world when the power of the church was much greater and it was the center of all education and power in Europe. Its hard to believe nowadays but the bright colors of the vestments would have been quite spectacular hundreds of years ago when life was a lot less bright. It was a real sign of status and power to have bright colours; most people in medieval Europe lived in a very dull world so the decorated church and the brightly dressed priest would have had a huge impact upon them.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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The priest’s preparation for service is done in the sacristy, a room in a church where vestments and other sacred items used in worship are kept. Because these are private places, usually unseen by the public, they have often been personalized by the clergymen and remind me of dressing rooms you would see backstage at a performance. What is fascinating about these rooms is the mixture of sacred religious objects (hosts, bibles, patens, chalices, etc.) mixed in with what we all see in everyday life (Irish dictionary, emergency phone numbers, radios, tea mugs, etc.). I remember in one particular sacristy seeing a poster of Liverpool football team hanging on the wall. I did not know if it was there to get a little extra help from Somebody above to win matches in the premier league or just for decoration! This extraordinary environment is perhaps the most intriguing site in any church because here sacred and profane blend and collide each other, more than anywhere else in a church.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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I suppose it was around at this time that I became fascinated by the mystery and layers of meaning, which are associated with the rituals of Catholicism. The meaning of these rituals and the symbolic purpose of the garments have lost their original significance and we just take them for granted I suppose. But every aspect of the mass, from the architecture of the church to the medieval vestments the priest wears, is designed to enhance the spectacle and theater of what you see happening at the altar.

Et Nunc © Alberto Maserin
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My work is an attempt to capture the transitional moment when the individual disappears beneath the sacred vestments and he readies himself to celebrate mass. Over the years, I have met a lot of clergymen who have all had very different personalities: gentlemen and intellectuals, traditional or modern, talkative and quiet, colourful and dull, but once they were in the act of celebrating mass they all have to conform to a certain expectation we have of how a priest should behave during this time. It is amazing how the wearing of a certain type of clothing transforms how you behave and act. Clothes alter our perception of people and in everyday life we look at the same person differently if they are dressed in casual clothes or if they are wearing a suit and tie. They are the same person but our perception of them changes depending on their outward appearance.

For more informations and photographs, please visit Alberto Maserin website.

Text and photos by Roberta Marroquín Doria.

During my teen years I did my first trip to Europe. I was absolutely mesmerized by the beauty all around, especially in Florence, Italy. In the years that came, I discovered my passion for art and photography throughout travelling, exploring and learning languages. Many years have passed now, and I have come to understand how big the influence of Renaissance, has been to my work.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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Perhaps one of the most inspiring experiences of my life was a trip to Israel, in the late 90’s. There, after having taken a diligent look throughout my surroundings, I understood more about the human condition and the cultural differences that exist around us. The trip was eye opening for me and I realized that I needed photography as a tool for communication. It was in the year 2000, while living in Paris, where I started developing an artistic eye. Photography became for me a language that communicates something about the universe, the humans and their mysteries, the origins and the legacy of the artist itself.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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One of my first photographic projects, which I started in 2001, was to capture human form in its sculpted representation, in other words, details of statues. The project was initially conceived as a play on mistaken identity, the notion of confusing the viewer by photographing marble at the hands of an old master and rendering a life-like effect. In the year that followed, an opportunity came to my way and I didn’t realized at that moment, it was about to change my life for good in ways that even today, continues to amazed me; The Circus. I was granted permission to follow the students of Centre National des Art du Cirque, in Chalons-on-Champagne, France. To what I felt for over that year I worked with these performances, the circus is energy and magic; the ring becomes a powerful place where life and death converges.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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Years passed and I started working on a project about the popular art, the origins and the identity of my native country, Mexico. “Roots” it’s a series of photographs that represents a language full of nostalgia and memories of my past, which emerged as a result of my own vision of my country and my immediate reality. As a Mexican that has lived in Paris for many years, I recognized the profound respect I have toward my country and how crucial all these years in France have been for my personal and professional development.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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After eight years living in Paris, I moved to New York City in the summer of 2008 to pursue a One-Year Certificate Program at the International Center of Photography. Through my photography I open a door, which leads to a world where I can create and imagine. In my search of the uncanny, I use photography as a support of the imaginary and light is my tool. My domains of predilection became spaces filled with darkness and with light I unveil a new universe where the spectator can start imagining.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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In 2009 I started working in a series of photographs called “Underneath light”. I have always being fascinated by my country’s ancestral beliefs in spirits that still commingle with Christianity. In my photos, I like to play with this idea. I become the Shaman, the seer, the healer, and the magician, divining spirits and revealing what remains unseen under ordinary light. Wielding a flashlight and using a large format or a digital camera, I create my own narrative of the night. The images result in an attempt to capture a desire to enter into a world of magic, those that exist in the space between the odd and the ordinary.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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By creating pockets of darkness and using a flashlight to reveal the sparsely illuminated details, I can generate ephemeral moments of profound meaning. I explore the mysterious, the sublime, the unexpected, the often obscure and unnoticed; some of those hidden meanings that lie on the edge of the consciousness.
Dreams, death, and dread are a recurring topic in my work. Some images evoke otherworldly feelings and often have a haunted effect; some others, convey a disembodied quality effect. As well there are allusions to primitive and Christian rituals that portray a ceremonial quality atmosphere.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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The large format camera allows for long exposures and results in a slower and often more contemplative quality; with a light source, I pierce into the mysterious of the night and the otherworldly: With multiple exposures I can depict the same figure in different poses. Superimposing images and overexposing specific areas of the picture, I can create transparent translucent feelings and ghostly blurry effects. The flashlight allows highlighting certain areas, obscuring others and crossing out selected details. The photographs become polymorphic entities.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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In Mexico, the belief in spirits is so pervasive and the paranormal become normal, and the normal does indeed become, paranormal. I find an uncanny beauty in this everyday dual existence, where the gloom visually heals the rifts between the two parallel worlds of dark and light and makes them whole.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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After having completed the “Underneath Light” series, this new body of work “Dans le Noir” (In the Dark) is more complex and strident. The photographs derive from a similar worldview, the two disparate cultures that coexist in my native Mexico: modern Christianity and the still-pervasive ancient Indian beliefs. The images reflect dreams, wishes and wants – panoply of memories, emotions and intents; they become more profound that what they appear to be and transmit an eerie poetic effect.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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These black and white, and color photographs are taken in different locations: the wild of Yucatan, the cold night of Central Park, and in private homes. The darkness becomes as important as the subject matter and leaves the viewer wondering what lies unrevealed. The seemingly normal scenarios and characters undergo an eerie metamorphosis during the process of shooting in the dark.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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Modern Christianity, as practiced in my country, with its punitive view of man, becomes a frightening theme. Macabre Aztec and Mayan beliefs that lie in the collective memory of Mexico suddenly emerge. The Christian and ancient Indian beliefs intertwine. Also intertwined is a view of nature as predatory. In addition, intertwined are allusions to ancient Greek and Roman myths and children’s stories.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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In my culture, I have experienced, a bombarding of images about suffering, fear, loneliness, despair, struggle, and moral duality. This sophisticated images arises some important issues about the existence of good and evil in the world and where the real and the unreal coexist in Mexican culture.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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This project represents a further venture into the realm of Magical Realism, where fantastic elements blend with the ordinary to show a deeper understanding of the world. Much like the well-known expressionist painting of Edvard Munch, “The Scream,” this body of work expresses an existential angst. These provocative photographs become my own primal outcry about the tragedy of the human condition.

Please visit Roberta Marroquín Doria for more informations and photographs.

© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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© Roberta Marroquín Doria
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