Photography

My portfolio from the class, Photographing the Social Landscape.
http://picasaweb.google.com/vinoad/ICPFolio#slideshow/

Of stones and spires

Historian Kenneth Clarke said, "Architecture is the most human of all arts." I am not so sure about that. Like a landscape which forms the backdrop, gorgeous but a backdrop nonetheless, to nature's center pieces – the leopards and elks, architecture is a fabric on which the crucial arts of painting, theater and human drama play out. Or so I feel.

That is not to say that a winter landscape isn't immensely fascinating. And the same goes for the Cambodian architecture. To me, architecture at its best has always been a naturalistic form of art. Something that clefts through the earth, sprouting deep roots.

As someone entirely non-religious, I am drawn to abandoned places of worship that have been partly reclaimed by nature. Cracked walls, shrubs, a moss cover – that sort of thing. I don't know why. Maybe a sense of history and antiquity. And a bit of irony.

Yesterday, I visited the St.John's Cathedral in the upper west side of New York. It's not abandoned, far from that. But it's incomplete and partially burned. And it's so massive – from the outside it looks like a small hill, the pillars and facades carved off a cliff.

The garden outside, to the left of the cathedral, has a massive statue of an angel slaying an upside down devil, whose head is dangling two feet from the ground. But instead of making it grim, the artist added a smiling sun, a giant crab and a bunch of animals into the fold. Pagan elements, I wonder. The whole scene is absurd in a sweet way, complete with a deer standing on his hind legs to nibble at the angel's wing tip.

Around the statue are numerous rough bronze figure, inches tall – works of a high school project. Further into the garden, on one side are gray stone buildings – elementary school, residences and library. On the other side is the fortress like wall of the cathedral. And in front of it are construction cones, brightly clothed straw figures and peacocks – multicolored and albino whites.

Inside the cathedral, most of the nave, the walkway leading to the center, was blocked off due to the construction. Yet, just the end of the nave in front of the altar, where we stood, was colossal. I looked around, taking in the magnitude of everything – the pillars surrounding the altar, the organ and the golden cross. Fantastic but not too different from the other cathedrals I have seen.

Then I looked up, expecting a steeple raising above my head or a ceiling covered in murals. What I saw was a flat ceiling with curved edges. It was so high, the light faded out and a hint of reddish brown, the color of the earth, was all that was visible. And walls were rough cut stone. I felt I was underground, in a deep cavern. It was as if the cathedral was build by digging out the earth.

In the semi circle behind the altar were an array of seven small chapels. Each dedicated to a group of immigrants – German, Italian. The design of each chapel varied in layout and texture – smooth ceramic, dark wood. The lighting was so stark that even a randomly placed chair seemed like the most aesthetic arrangement.

Back in the nave, on the far ends, flanking the rows of brown wooden chairs, was photo exhibit by a Romanian artist featuring the priests of an orthodox monastery. The black and white photographs, with its human faces and humble dwelling, was an interesting juxtaposition against the mighty granite walls.

(click to view the entire photo album)

What is this about..

One wintry evening, I walked out of the movies and stood on the empty sidewalk, breathing out visible puffs of air and waited for the trembling to subside. I had watched the last hour of Capote in total stillness, my hands clasped tight.

Over dinner, I couldn't hold my excitement. "The movie was amazing," I said to friends who hadn't seen it, "Two men shoot down a family in a small town in Kansas. Truman Capote travels there to understand the psyche of the scarred town and the killers, and writes a book."

"I didn't think you would be interested in that," came the reply. And it was true. The book Capote wrote, In Cold Blood or the movie they made out of it doesn't interest me at all. I just don't find the psyche of the townsmen or the killers intriguing the way Truman Capote did. But this movie is about that intrigue of Capote. Which I find immensely interesting.

I am fascinated by Capote's fascination.

Another time, I was reading Matthew Pearl's novel The Dante Club and raving about it. It's about a few Boston poets (Longfellow, Holmes, Lowell) translating Dante during the eighteen fifties and how they deal with crazy events that happen in the city exactly as described in Dante's book.

A friend said, "I can't believe you read The Dante Club and not Dante." No disrespect intended, but I just can't get into Dante. Yet I couldn't put down The Dante Club – though I am not a fan of mystery novels – because of the poets' fascination of Dante. I was fascinated by their fascination.

This theme began to recur over and over again. In Movies – Shawshank Redemption, Lives of Others, Almost Famous. In Books – Flaubert's Parrot, The Great Gatsby, Old School.

I want to explore my fascination for the theme of fascination by critiquing and talking about these works one at a time. Also, when does fascination become an obsession?