Und3rgr0und J4tt1
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meet visual artist
Jatin Gandhi. I am a visual artist. I mostly use the media of photography, painting and drawing to express what I cannot in words. This site showcases my work and is a crude beginning towards cataloguing all my attempts at producing visual art at one place.
JATIN'S PROFILE
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On March 8, 2009, when I picked up my camera and took the night bus to McLeod Ganj in the North Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, I only knew that I was going to take some photos. I wanted to click pictures of Tibetans in exile – peaceful Buddhists — and on my way back squeeze in a trip to Anandpur Sahib, where the martial Nihang Sikhs display their horse riding and weapon using skills at the festival of Hola Mohalla, around the same time that the rest of North India celebrates Holi.
The sleepy hill town would have slept forever, perhaps, had the Tibetans not landed here five decades ago led by the Dalai Lama. They fled Tibet after their uprising against the Chinese failed. March 10, 2009, marked 50 years of the uprising and McLeod Ganj’s growing identity crisis. Anandpur Sahib, on the other hand, is the place where the tenth Sikh Guru, Gobind Singh, baptised five of his followers on March 30, 1699. The Khalsa – the Army of the Pure – was born. Even more than three centuries later, the Nihangs live and act as though they are preparing for battles that will be fought on horseback. They display their military skills for the Sikh devotees who come to bow their heads at the birthplace of Khalsa.
The pictures that follow were taken in these two places over a day and a half in McLeod and over a couple of hours in Anandpur Sahib. It was a fascinating journey for me. I hope I have been able to capture a part of it here, apart from the usual contrast between the two communities. the pictures here, appear in reverse order: Anandpur Sahib first and then, McLeod Ganj
Jatin Gandhi. I am a visual artist. I mostly use the media of photography, painting and drawing to express what I cannot in words. This site showcases my work and is a crude beginning towards cataloguing all my attempts at producing visual art at one place.
JATIN'S PROFILE
CLICK HERE TO VIEW JATIN'S PHOTOGRAPHY
On March 8, 2009, when I picked up my camera and took the night bus to McLeod Ganj in the North Indian state of Himachal Pradesh, I only knew that I was going to take some photos. I wanted to click pictures of Tibetans in exile – peaceful Buddhists — and on my way back squeeze in a trip to Anandpur Sahib, where the martial Nihang Sikhs display their horse riding and weapon using skills at the festival of Hola Mohalla, around the same time that the rest of North India celebrates Holi.
The sleepy hill town would have slept forever, perhaps, had the Tibetans not landed here five decades ago led by the Dalai Lama. They fled Tibet after their uprising against the Chinese failed. March 10, 2009, marked 50 years of the uprising and McLeod Ganj’s growing identity crisis. Anandpur Sahib, on the other hand, is the place where the tenth Sikh Guru, Gobind Singh, baptised five of his followers on March 30, 1699. The Khalsa – the Army of the Pure – was born. Even more than three centuries later, the Nihangs live and act as though they are preparing for battles that will be fought on horseback. They display their military skills for the Sikh devotees who come to bow their heads at the birthplace of Khalsa.
The pictures that follow were taken in these two places over a day and a half in McLeod and over a couple of hours in Anandpur Sahib. It was a fascinating journey for me. I hope I have been able to capture a part of it here, apart from the usual contrast between the two communities. the pictures here, appear in reverse order: Anandpur Sahib first and then, McLeod Ganj
