Storytelling through India and the Himalayas with Amol Nakve

What inspires you to take photographs, and why travel photography in particular?

Photography gives me a unique opportunity to view things in myriad dimensions. The way photographs have been clicked gives us multiple ways of understanding the different shades of life. I obsess over perspectives through observation which inspires me to click.

The highest form that art can take is when you have created a magnum opus. Every photographer is on this journey to reach excellence. I am on this journey too and dream of clicking photographs that have been never been done before. The learning phase and desire will never cease.

Travel sometimes leaves you speechless and then leads you to something that has withstood the test of time - storytelling. It is equally important to gather and capture those stories. Call it an enabler if you will – that is photography’s relationship with storytelling, and with permanency. They will never be lost even in the sands of time.

My career is in human resource management and my job gives me an opportunity to travel to various parts of India. I like to meet and interact with people from diverse backgrounds – social, financial, and education levels - capture their lives, albeit a small part, and have my experiences permanently etched through clicks. Moreover, travel and photography have a symbiotic relationship with travel photography going beyond the boundaries of space and time. The exposure one gets in cultural, linguistic, and religious aspects, and most importantly how humans are in their natural habitat AND not-so-natural habitat, is comparable to best-in-class education from the Ivy Leagues, even beyond, I’d say.

What's your background in photography?

It was there in my mind for a very long time but I immersed myself into it in 2012 when I bought my first camera. It was a point-and-shoot one. As I already mentioned my job gave me an opportunity to travel to various parts of India, so I grabbed it and took to photography, alongside. In 2016, I bought my first DSLR camera through my savings, and thereafter, the frequency of my visits increased (I made sure) and so did the number of clicks. Every moment I see light, I see HOPE and feel the need to script a story with that light. To enhance my technical skills, recently, I completed a diploma in photography from a leading online course provider. But for me, it’s very important to learn what the mind’s eye shows and this is something that cannot be learned in books or tutorials. You have to be moving around all the time with your trusted confidante – the camera. If you miss the moment, the camera “nudges” you. It is a sacred relationship a photographer develops with his tool.

How would you describe the work you do?

My images have a direct message and sometimes, a tacit one as well. For example, the Himalayas tells the story of strength and massiveness, but in the process has it become arrogant and accessible only to a few? Bazaars/marketplaces are about livelihoods and joy but they may also be about a buyer’s despair if the price tag is out of bounds. Somewhere they merge. I feel whenever someone views images clicked by me they should understand the depth of what my camera is trying to say. At best, I am the medium.

I’m happy to say that my work is creating a distinguishable pattern of my travel experiences and leaving an impression on viewers. I often spend time with my earlier photographs trying to see if I could have done it differently. Yet another story may have emerged - perhaps.