Ayamikhan

Among the photographs I made during my years in Nepal are two silhouettes of the Hyatt against the surrounding landscape.

The photographs in this series were taken with a disposable Kodak camera whose cardboard and plastic body became waterlogged during the monsoon. Despite its condition, it survived long enough to document a few moments from my years in the Himalayas.

At the time, the unseen foreground was an extensive landfill of plastic bags, rotting refuse, insects and stray dogs on land owned by a nearby monastery.

By fortunate timing rather than careful planning, I arrived as the setting sun cast the foreground into deep shadow, concealing the landfill and revealing only the landscape beyond. That was the moment I made the photographs.

When the developer later showed the images to local people, something unexpected happened. They did not simply see the Hyatt or the mountains. They saw the possibility of the land itself.

Funds were raised to purchase the site, clear the waste, and transform it into gardens and a plant nursery.

I have often thought that the camera did not hide reality. It revealed another one.

Sometimes a photograph is not only a record of what exists, but a quiet suggestion of what could exist.