Exhibition opening by Ananta Dasa

Dear friends, on April 20 at 19.00 The Gallery of Classical Photography invites you to the opening of Ananta Dasa’s exhibition. 50 landscapes, portraits and genre scenes captured by the photographer will be exhibited under the title “Eight Million Four Hundred Thousand Steps. Admission to the opening is free.

Photographs taken at one of India’s largest pilgrimage sites, the city of “5,000 temples” Vrindavan, reveal to the viewer the simple and beautiful lives of people that are closed to the average tourist, rushing through countries and cultures at a speed that does not allow one to truly appreciate, feel, love.

“According to the ancient Indians, there are eight million four hundred thousand forms of life in the material universe. The human soul goes through evolution, being born and dying, until it takes on divine form. I have tried to convey a sense of unreality, the divine essence of what is happening, the sacred meaning of literally every breath, movement in space…”, – wrote Dasa.

Ananta Dasa’s work cannot be called a European man’s view of India. The photographer is not perceived by the people in the pictures as something alien, his presence is invisible. Dasa is fully immersed in his environment, he is part of that environment, it’s one of the prerequisites of his research. The artist lived in India from 1988 to 2000, adopting Hindu traditions and practices and pursuing photojournalism, which he defines as “street meditation. He used a medium format twin lens Rolleiflex camera.

For more information about the exhibition, visit the website of the Gallery of Classical Photography >