The Modern Master - How A Journalist Turned Photographer Has Become India's Most Powerful Name In Visual Storytelling

He is intrinsically shy. 

For those who know him closely and have followed his genius, the man is almost a ghost. 

You will never meet anybody who wants to run from his own shows. But Kounteya Sinha hates attention. 

He likes the quiet. It helps him think. His projects are laborious. Great stories take time in its telling. But the day Sinha opens it to the world, it becomes mortal and ends in his head. Till that day, he works on it till his bones ache.

He is Everybody's man - generous and incisive with the most brilliant mind. And it is here that a thousand cutting ideas breed. 

An Opening for any artist is the big day. But for Sinha - a revered journalist turned photographer - India's most powerful Pied Piper, it is the day he begins working on his next big idea.

Integrity and innovation as a lifestyle quotient is one of the enduring characteristics of a few men in this millennium. It flatters men even when men don’t know it. It’s the classiest equation there is, along with gin, vermouth and a twist of lemon. A man  of integrity and someone who is constantly reinventing himself is a man with someplace to go, and that place is important. 

I have watched Sinha for nearly two decades now - both in the newsroom as a journalist and now for the past 10 years as a photographer and visual artist. He always had a rare gift - a knack of bringing out the most powerful stories with complete ease. Watching him function is like watching a game of baccarat at the high-roller tables but there is only one man in the picture. He weaves his way in and out of conversations, creates his own corollaries amidst people at high places and always comes home to roost in Kolkata because that is where his heart is.

But what makes Sinha one of India's greatest modern masters of visual storytelling, a photographer and storyteller whose gift is unparalleled? 

It is his sheer brilliance tossed with an enormous intellect and a bigger heart. He cares for the world, for stories that no one wants to tell - on ground, nomadic. He constantly combines the panache of being daring and classic at the same time, so that he can keep bridging  many of the best ideas to make a difference to some lives. That’s the power of imagination, and what dialogues can do. You learn these rules and follow them until you realize that it’s time to stretch them and see what happens. 

In his book The Ascent of Man, author  Jacob Bronowski  writes,  "In body and in mind he is the explorer of nature, the ubiquitous animal, who did not find but made his home in every continent.” 

This in essence is the portrait of Kolkata’s export to the world in the form of Kounteya Sinha - a man who has travelled and worked in nearly 100 countries.

In an era of obsessed selfie proclaiming projections, Sinha is happy to be one who takes shoelace-triggered snapshots of himself somewhere in a monastery in Ladakh rather than spend time boasting of his prowess. 

Beautifully composed, full of dizzy energy, the photographs he takes and the stories he tells swells with a top-of-the-world sense of triumph. In addition to his other photo credits, Kounteya can lay claim to one of the most originalsignatures of photojournalism in a world where many are staging scenes to scream a story.

On World Photography Day one must recognise the prismatic preferences offered in a vast country of geological, cultural and cinematic perspectives like India and my inner eye moves from India’s greatest Raghubir Singh, Raghu Rai Ram Rahman to the silent legend in Kolkata Kounteya Sinha. 

In a journey of myriad moorings he has combed India from East to West to create a mapping of memories and experiences  that are steeped in the tenets of time past and time present. Photography for Kounteya is more than formally realistic moments, it consists of  inventive compositions born of the strings of  masterful technique — this makes the viewers  realize images of photography are  not simply reportage, not mere mundane niceties, they must brim the depths of historicity to become art. Kounteya sees the world through words. That has been his discipline for nearly two decades as a journalist - his last stint being The Times of India's United Kingdom Representative or London Correspondent. His vast knowledge across fields - be it medicine to space, geopolitics to communities, science to literature, art to fashion comes handy. He sees around him with an eye that is unchallenged in its prowess.

In 2016, he took up the cause of Kolkata's iconic rickshawallah. In a historic first time ever, he invited 60 such rickshawallas as chief guests for the opening of his stellar show 'STONE' and also managed to rope in veteran actor Om Puri to travel to Kolkata to embrace the rickshawallas and interact with them.

Puri played the part of a rickshaw wall in the famous film City of Joy. Sinha has campaigned for Kolkata's dying heritage that brought the city to a standstill.

He joined the Calcutta Heritage Collective and unveiled his 2018 summer repertoire 'VIVA' which was probably one of the most acclaimed and talked about shows that Kolkata has ever seen. The city's entire glitterati attended 'VIVA' that means alive in Spanish.

Kashmir's Human Face

36 is more than just a number for Kounteya.  

It stands for the number of times Kounteya has been to Kashmir since 2019.

Kounteya's work in Kashmir goes beyond  being merely iconic -  his Project Bismillah that he has been working on since 2016 and is still a work in progress.

The world has seen a little glimpse of it and has taken everyone's breath away. But Kounteya says his actual Kashmir repertoire is in the vault kept safely till he thinks it is time to show it. What has been revealed to the world aren't even the best stories but just enough to skim the surface. 

As Kounteya who is immensely loved in Kashmir across strata, where is lovingly called Dada, says "Project Bismillah is all about using creative arts like photography to mitigate negative propaganda in a place of conflict. The year 2020 - infamous for the Covid lockdown - taught us the greatest lesson - no person can survive isolation. We like the company of our family, friends and the strangers we meet. So is true for a place - it too cannot survive alone, churning in a constant whirlpool of economic and cultural isolation. Kashmir is an intrinsic part of our anatomy - ours to keep, ours to glorify, ours to savour and its fate - ours to keep. I have been deeply touched by Kashmir's scorching warmth - its unparalleled hospitality and natural beauty - several times before. And hence, I was adamant that instead of sitting in my crimson carpeted drawing room, ruing Kashmir's fate that is mostly imposed on them, I shall in fact, help change it by opening people's eyes. No threats existed – but people refused to go there. Propaganda said it was unsafe. It wasn’t".

He adds "I believe that the greatest tragedy of a place is when we forget them. Nothing destroys it like isolation. Abandonment, as a result of conflict and disaster – man made or natural, causes its decay. This is when cultures, customs, tangible and intangible traditions and folklore are lost. How long can a tearing performance last in an empty theatre? Bismillah by definition means In God’s name I begin.

Project Bismillah is about photographing Kashmir - travelling to the far ends of the state - discovering villages and people off the map - ultimately culminating into a body of work that intends to remind the world what unimaginable beauty runs through the veins of Kashmir. And the strength of their comebacks. Project Bismillah Isn't about taking sides". 

Project Bismillah has now become a rage. It is being talked about everywhere across the world. It is a case study of the highest order on how Visual Arts can truly play a powerful role in bringing a place of conflict back to its feet.

Vrindavan's Anonymous Widows

His recent work on Vrindavan's widows - Lest We Forget - A Sisterhood called White" was an absolute masterpiece in storytelling. An extraordinary repertoire of black and white photographs - on the invisible life of Vrindavan's widows - taken for the first time ever - from within the precincts of the ashrams. Vrindavan has been home to thousands of widows for decades, ostracised and forgotten. Almost 90 percent of such women are from Bengal. But interestingly, this body of tremendously incisive work shows their life from the perspective of dignity, devotion and hope.

Sinha, known globally for his unparalleled human storytelling, said "It is often said that a woman from Bengal would prefer to beg with dignity than stay in a palace with indignity. Vrindavan is estimated to have over 20,000 widows - 90% of them are believed to be from Bengal. Vrindavan for most of Bengal's widows have for decades been the escape - either from familial strife, forced and abandoned or by choice, in search of peace and devotion". 

"The life inside of the ashrams is an invisible world, shrouded in mystery. Information has hardly come out on the quality of their life within it. Traditional thinking for ages has talked about the abysmal state of Vrindavan's widows. But a lot has changed over the years for the better. Not everyone has been touched by that change, I agree. A lot of widows still need that helping hand. But a lot of them have benefitted - better quality of life, nutritious food, warm clothing, healthcare and above all - a life of dignity". 

"That's the story I wanted to tell after seeing it with my own eyes. Widows now have the right to citizenship, they all have aadhar cards, zero bank accounts and pension cards. They are being trained in skill building and income generation programs. Slowly and steadily, they are becoming entrepreneurs. This repertoire is real, intimate and personal. Change comes from information. These photographs are intended to show you the beauty of their sisterhood - away from home, their new family - in a changing India. This show celebrates White - a colour that had become their prison, but not anymore," according to Sinha.

Ayodhya's Beads Of Bhakti

After watching  frenzied construction work which provided the backdrop in the northern Indian city of Ayodhya, Kounteya then directed his lens on  a vast  group of  pilgrims, the city’s arched sandstone gates, and its broad corridor leading to a grand new $217m (£170m) temple for the Hindu deity Lord Ram . Many nationalist leaders and believers  considered it to be a "Hindu Vatican". 

In a case of capturing the pilgrims as seen it became a matrix of moody, rhapsody.With the stark animation of the tilak on the forehead called Namam to the Rudraksha beads to the dark wrinkled hands that touched the name of Ram in Devanagari script each image became an intonation of inspiration. 

His love for unveiling stories  brings him into his own lacing of legacies. As an outsider he becomes an insider who often views from a distance to imbue his composition with a lyrical resonance along with a rhythmic beauty. Over the years he has  gradually  arrived at a unique way of reproducing the jostling  juxtapositions and dilemma filled  discontinuities that confront him through every hour of his hunt for haunting vignettes and vistas.

As a photographer, Kounteya is one of those remarkable photographers  who could absorb a litany of legacies born of  different impulses to transform them into a language entirely  his own. The artist in Kounteya is informed by the tradition of Indian rituals and sacred festivals , in which a single picture can portray scenes that  proceed simultaneously but disconnectedly: in spaces as humble as a fragment of a wall, a  garden, through open windows and doorways, within a passing stream of humanity. What becomes the common thread is the sensitivity to subject and theme.

Mirzapur's Women Weavers

At Bikaner House in Delhi last year, Sinha’s portraits of Mirzapur’s carpet weavers spun stories that moved from loom to light with the hands of its women weavers and their moments that wove carpets that move  from the corridors of royalty to haute couture boudoirs. Here in the Main Gallery of Bikaner House Delhi, Obeetee’s  illustrious legacy came into view in the show Fatelines. 

“Carpets are works of art. Weaving them is one of the ancient crafts for which India is so rightly famous and carpet manufacturing put money where it’s most needed - into the villages of India,” commented Sir Mark Tully, former Bureau Chief, BBC, New Delhi in his narration of the documentary, Rugs for Life, that traced Obeetee’s history and efforts in innovation and development. 

But Kounteya went beyond Tully’s words to create an exhibition that hummed the truths of  the cornerstone of Obeetee’s legacy. 

Within the women’s arc of daily lives we saw the unravelling of a 102-year-old legacy that allows us to not only preserve an age-old craft but also help the women weavers of Bhadohi, Mirzapur find their own path and voice. 

Kounteya’s images brought back history. In 2015, Obeetee initiated the women weavers' program, and it  recorded an astounding 400% increase in female labour participation, making it a poster scheme for financial freedom and self-reliance among women in India. 

"Fatelines: How the Threads of Obeetee Changed the Destiny of Mirzapur's Women,” became a photo exhibition that captured  women working with  looms, laughing and breaking free from patriarchal shackles. The photo series was an impeccable display of art in its most raw form, showcasing how these women  weave their own grand stories in simplicity. 

Kounteya created an  exhibition that unravelled sensational stories of these women who, until 2017, had never stepped out of their homes. They stepped out of their homes  to learn the ancient art of carpet making, and in doing so, have become  torchbearers of a changing society. 

"Fate Lines" portrayed  inspiring journeys, highlighting dogged determination, resilience, and  significant roles  played in reshaping the social fabric of the region. Kounteya captured the beauty of toil and labour through these women who shattered traditional barriers to become symbols of empowerment, engagement with life and the progress of living every day with something to create.

Conclusion

Kounteya moves between time and space to create frames that become a leaf in the pages of art history. The camera for him is an instrument that fashions his sketchbooks of humanity. It is dictated by intuition and defined by an integrity that great Bengali giants Rabindranath Tagore and Satyajit Ray stood for.The titles of his exhibitions reflect his brevity and dexterity of the annals of journalism history when he compiled stories for more than 25 years. At a time, when artists across the globe are finding it difficult to fill gallery space, each of Kounteya's shows are a stampede with the who's who from across India's corridors of power and aesthetics crowding it. Nobody draws the crowd like he does - a modern day Pied Piper. 

When you think of the fact that Kounteya has primed his space across time as a  journalist whose business has been just verbal acoustics, Kounteya has a natural allegiance to the drama of compelling visual conversations.

His photography, unparalleled visual storytelling stems from his years of peeling off nuances of the world only he sees. Some questions come up in our minds.

Why is his work revered so much? What separates him from the rest is his unending hunger to explore far flung places and come back with a mosaic of more than a thousand tales. Perhaps in more ways than one here is a photojournalist who keeps himself in the background as he stokes the coals of hidden embers in sand and soil and sea.

His years in London filled within him an insatiable need to break away and find new terrain to discover. With camera in hand he became a veritable global vagabond - travelled to over 80 countries - when he engaged his prowess at the verbal and the visual - his words and images brought  the dead back to life.

What is uncanny is that he hid his pain in the colour strokes that he captured. His images have about them a rare resonance of romance that kindles many responses and this is what brings back his clients who want to hang his images in their many corridors of certainty and high calibre meeting places.

As he jet sets all over the world you are given a whiff of the unravelling of brand Kounteya as an ambassador of goodwill and grace. The super rich eat of his hands because of his mind - a phenomenal intellect with a heart that is rooted - intriguing how  he can sit and drink tea with a rickshaw wallah on the streets of a village in West Bengal at one time and interview Bill Gates on the other. 

His popularity sets its own benchmark - we have the world's top galleries hankering for his time and showcasing his repertoire - but he is never to be caught and pinned down because he is so busy running around doing more than a thousand things for others.

One thing that stands apart is his brilliance, his brain power and his innate quality of humanism. His power of connectivity and relativity is what keeps him ahead of the pack. It is the abundance of his  innumerable ideas that creates trust and textures of trust.

Generous to a fault ,  honest and an epitome of his namesake Karna - Kounteya is fiercely loyal as an individual. It is this strong thread of honesty that defines his very being, he can’t be bought, he is both aggressive and courageous and can make anything happen however impossible. 

Sinha's love for the medium takes us back to the great Henri Cartier Bresson who said: 
“It is an illusion that photos are made with the camera… they are made with the eye, heart and head.” 
Bresson also said that :  
“The creative act lasts but a brief moment, a lightning instant of give-and-take, just long enough for you to level the camera and to trap the fleeting prey in your little box.”

For Kounteya the composition and the expressions of humanity are an offering that is defined by the power of one’s own intuition.Then it is the dynamics of visual vitality that come into play to create stories that live beyond time and tide.