One afternoon in the early 1980s, a man walked into a small photography studio in central India, looking to have his portrait made for the first time in his life.
In the photograph, he’s illuminated by studio light, positioned in front of a plain backdrop that's rendered out of focus. Across his otherwise relaxed face sit two jet black eyes, stretched wide open, piercing the camera’s lens. Frozen in the photographic moment, this exchange draws us in and we become part of its dialogue. The photographer captures the man’s face, but the man looks back, at him and at us, as if to say: “Here I am, but here you are too.”
A farmer from near Nagda visits Punjabi’s studio to have his portrait made for the first time. While the purpose of the photo is unclear, the man’s wide-eyed stare suggests that the camera either caught him by surprise or that he was overly exerting himself in an attempt to pose appropriately. His all-white attire, turban and Punjabi’s use of a shallow depth of field add to the portrait’s intrigue.
Beginnings
Born in 1957, a decade after Independence, the man who took this portrait of the farmer was Suresh Punjabi, the owner of Suhag Studio, which he opened in the town of Nagda, Madhya Pradesh in the late 1970s. Punjabi grew up in a changing India, where Jawaharlal Nehru’s vision for postcolonial modernisation was gradually transforming small and mid-sized towns across the country. At the same time, photography studios were proliferating beyond big cities, quickly becoming fixtures of community life in places like Nagda.
The Business of Dreams explores Punjabi’s archive from the 1970s and 80s, when he produced a variety of portraits on a daily basis, from the formal and administrative to the informal and stylised. Drawing from existing literature, visual analyses, technical histories and conversations with the photographer, this exhibition shows Suhag Studio as the fixed point against which Nagda’s evolution was chronicled.
One of the earliest and perhaps most obvious drivers of Suhag Studio's business were administrative portraits, which his clients requested frequently and for a number of reasons, resulting in thousands of images.
Unlike the other administrative images in Punjabi's archive, this is a full-length portrait because the older man in it asked to be photographed on his crutches, so he could claim disability entitlements from the government. The evidentiary quality of the photograph meant it was an important tool for India’s expanding identification and welfare system. With three studio lights focused directly on the standing subject, the portrait highlights both the man and his condition, making Punjabi an important middleman in the way he is able to be ‘seen’ by the state.
Although it's difficult to say with certainty what the purpose for this portrait was, the Marwadi woman sitting for it expresses a degree of formality, with her upright posture, eyes gazing straight into the camera and head covered by her chunni (thin scarf). The studio lights that often appear on the edges of such images were ultimately always cropped out by Punjabi, but their existence in this image nonetheless underscores the sense of performance that his portraiture involved.
Identification & Records
By the late 1970s, identity documents had embedded themselves deeply into Indian civic life. Standardised photographs became necessary for many administrative activities, from accessing food subsidies to completing job applications. Punjabi’s studio provided an essential administrative service – and for Nagda’s poor and working classes, it became one of the few ways in which the presence of India’s creaking bureaucracy was felt.
Most people interpreted these photographic services through their own needs. One man insisted on a full-length portrait showing his crutches in order to qualify for disability entitlements; another arrived in a crisp white shirt for a passport photograph. When juxtaposed, these images highlight the sheer diversity of Punjabi’s clients, who collectively appear as a mosaic of faces, registering the state’s efforts to make them ‘legible’ citizens.
An older woman poses for a formal portrait at Suhag Studio. Like many of the other women photographed by Punjabi for this reason, this sitter too has a chunni (thin scarf) draped over her head, a convention that has since changed as the production of administrative photographs such as these has become increasingly standardised.
An older man sits for an administrative portrait, looking directly into the camera with his light-coloured eyes, his cap slightly askew. Amara ji, Punjabi recalls, was involved with the Indian National Congress, in addition to working at a shoe polish shop in Nagda at the time.
An older woman poses for a formal portrait with her chunni (thin scarf) draped over her head.Immediately apparent in this photograph is the care with which Punjabi lights her face, giving it a discernible softness and dimensionality. The lighting arrangement also brings greater focus to the woman’s eyebrows and stare, which seems directed both at the camera and at some space behind it.
A young man in a turban and an unbuttoned shirt sits for what is likely an administrative portrait. Punjabi often photographed farmers and labourers working in and around Nagda during this period, many of whom were visiting a studio for the first time. The increasingly intricate identity apparatus that developed in India after Independence made the studio a significant point of contact between the ordinary working person and the state.
A lanky young man, likely in his late teens or early twenties, strikes a stately pose — with an upright back and straight shoulders — while staring into Punjabi’s camera. Despite the fact that the painted segment of the studio backdrop peeks in from the left corner of the image, this portrait was probably made for an administrative purpose.
A middle-aged man poses for an administrative portrait in a plain shirt and long hair. Looking at his face, one can clearly tell how Punjabi decided to leave the background out of focus and light the sitter directly from the front, which incidentally also highlights the displaced iris on his left eye.
A teenager sits for an administrative portrait in front of a plain backdrop, possibly for the purpose of finishing a college admission or examination form — a popular reason for which many younger sitters visited Suhag Studio.
A young man, dressed neatly in a blazer and tie — both props — sits for what appears to be a formal portrait. The lack of stylisation in the image and the sitter’s impassive stare suggest that the image was likely commissioned for an administrative purpose.
A woman stares directly into the camera for what appears to be an administrative photograph. For many from Nagda’s working class, such administrative photographs occasioned their first ever visits to a studio. In this particular image, it’s interesting to note the woman’s choice to keep her head covered with her chunni (thin scarf)— a convention that has since changed among such identification photographs, as they have become more standardised, typically disallowing any head coverings.
A young man with a straight face and a pencil moustache poses for an administrative portrait, illuminated by studio light cast on him from his left. The style of lighting seen here was typical of many of Punjabi’s administrative photographs from this period.
A girl with short pigtails and a straight face poses for an administrative portrait. Because the girl is of school-age, it’s quite possible that this portrait was made to satisfy an admission or examination application.
A man in a prop blazer and a popped collar poses for a portrait. His relaxed expression and stylish attire suggest that this photograph could have been used for a number of purposes — possibly even to acquire arranged marriage proposals, which adds another dimension to the use of the word "administrative" to describe this part of Punjabi's archive.
A young man with a sharp jawline sits for an administrative portrait in front of a partially painted studio backdrop. While possibly an administrative photograph, the stiffness of the man’s facial expression — brightly illuminated by studio light — is broken by the slight droop of his upper body.
A young man with an arched moustache, neat hair and a worn shirt rolled at the sleeves poses for an administrative portrait, with the composure of his face complementing the relaxed lean of his upper body.
A young man with a thin moustache, combed-over hair and a striped shirt sits for an administrative portrait, with the head of one of Punjabi's studio lights peeking in from the bottom right of the frame.
Dressed professionally in a white shirt and thick-rimmed glasses, the subject poses for a passport photo. Because of the way in which he carries himself in the portrait — and the minimal styling that’s added on Punjabi’s part — it is likely that this was not the man’s first visit to a photo studio.
There was, of course, much more to Punjabi's work than administrative portraits. Life in Nagda at the time, like in many towns in India, moved along a network of overlapping social relations — romantic, platonic, filial, communal, professional. As photography opened up new opportunities for self-representation, these relations seeped into Suhag Studio as well.
A portrait of two siblings in which a woman ties a ceremonial decorative thread, or rakhi, on her brother’s wrist, in exchange for a gift from him. During the Hindu festival of Raksha Bandhan — commemorating the bond between siblings — people lined up extensively outside Suhag Studio, waiting to have their portrait made. Although the tying of the rakhi is typically a family affair, the growth of studios across small and mid-sized towns in India brought the practice out of the home and into the shared space of the studio.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of three seated men) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12251
Three railway workers from the town of Jhabua in western Madhya Pradesh sit for a portrait together, their all-white attire accentuating the effect created by their strong gazes. Many of Punjabi’s group portraits feature this arrangement, where two or three people sit shoulder to shoulder on a bench, facing his camera directly.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Group portrait of a family) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1986-87 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12225
In one of Punjabi’s most crowded compositions, a family of eight gathers into a tight frame for a group portrait. During this period, it was not uncommon for Punjabi to leave his studio (and sometimes Nagda as well) to photograph large families, often in front of their ancestral homes. In this case however, the family just about manages to squeeze into the indoor space. Accommodating all eight members also brings the studio’s ceiling into view, highlighting the limited, 10 x 20 feet space in which he worked during those years.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of two men) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985-86 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12214
Two friends, dressed rather stylishly, stand in a slight three-quarter profile while looking directly into the camera. Punjabi often offered props such as sunglasses and hats to his sitters, however the origin of the pieces of clothing featured here — including the flared trousers and blazers — remains unclear. One interesting clue, likely intended to be cropped, is the pair of slippers near the bottom left of the frame. Only one of the men is wearing shoes, suggesting that the shoes are props and the slippers belong to him.
Friends & Family
Nagda’s growth into an industrial centre in Madhya Pradesh was felt increasingly by the smaller villages around it. In addition to its local population, people from these villages, as well as others travelling by train through Nagda Junction, also visited Punjabi’s studio, which had a diverse clientele including Hindus, Muslims, Sikhs, Jains, Christians and adivasis from neighbouring regions.
As the town grew, people began visiting studios more frequently and often in groups. Punjabi's sitters brought their social worlds into the photographic space and he worked to represent them against this context. The resulting images show us packed families, impassive coworkers, bashful lovers, playful friends and various expressions of cultural and religious celebration — connections, seen and unseen, caught mid-pose.
In this portrait, like so many others from Punjabi’s archive, Suhag Studio’s painted background reappears, featuring a lone pillar accompanied by thick drapes and a curling base design. In an otherwise confined photographic space, this painting enlarges the portrait’s sense of grandeur.
For Behru Singh and his son Laxman sitting to his right, this photograph could have meant a number of things. Although it doesn’t serve a strictly administrative purpose, their stately facial expressions and matching turbans lend a level of gravity to the scene Punjabi captures.
Singh and his son are train porters, photographed wearing the copper armbands synonymous with the profession. At the time, the armband stood as an especially charged symbol of working class pride — crystallised by the release of Coolie (1983), where Amitabh Bachchan plays a porter from Mumbai. Objects such as the copper armband allowed people to bring a range of cultural referents and sociopolitical attitudes into the photographic space.
In many of Punjabi’s group portraits, it was not uncommon to see sitters wearing watches as a symbol of professionalism and style. For this image, it seems both father and son have made sure each of theirs can be seen.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Seated portrait of three friends) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12213
In this informal group portrait, the relationship between three male friends finds an intriguing physical manifestation. The man in the centre stares directly into the lens, deadpan, while holding the hand of the man to his right who, in turn, gazes at the third man on the very left, whose focus is caught by something beyond the frame. The language of eyes and hands gains an almost filmic intensity through Punjabi’s treatment, which highlights his enduring interest in capturing unseen and understated gestures in his portraits.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Seated portrait of three siblings) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985-86 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12217
A boy flanked by his sisters, sits on a bench and poses for a family portrait. All three sitters bear a similar posture: upright and with their hands on their knees. The boy’s tie and sunglasses are both props, as is the nose ring worn by the woman on the left of the frame. Interestingly, the placement of hands also reveals that the boy’s nails are painted, a kind of stylistic expression not uncommon among many young men from small and mid-sized towns in India.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Seated family portrait) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1984-85 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12190
A man, his wife and her sister sit shoulder to shoulder in front of one of Suhag Studio’s painted backdrops. The tie and dhoti (unstitched sarong worn by men) that the man is wearing both belong to the studio, while the coordinated folding of the arms allows all three sitters to showcase the watches they’re wearing on their respective wrists.
There is a remarkable simultaneity in many of Punjabi’s group images, especially those with two to three people. In this portrait, the three men appear to almost meld together in their white attire, dark black hair and angled seating position. The men place their hands casually on their thighs while stiffening their torsos for the portrait.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a family) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1987 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12234
A couple poses for the camera with their young daughter in hand. The angle at which the portrait is made makes the couple appear notably tall, with the husband’s head nearly reaching the studio’s ceiling. There is a strange, almost painterly quality to the image, as the couple, dressed almost entirely in white, is foregrounded by additional lighting.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of two young men with rifles) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1988 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12231
In all likelihood, the rifles carried by the young men in this photograph were theirs. While props were a vital resource for clients looking for more individualised portraits of themselves, it was also common for people to bring their own possessions to Suhag Studio. At this time, gun licenses weren’t very difficult to acquire, especially for those from nearby villages. These men likely travelled from outside Nagda to Punjabi’s studio to have a portrait made with their prized possessions.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length group portrait of three girls) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12262
Although it's difficult to say with certainty, the three young girls in this portrait are likely sisters who planned to have their photograph made on this day. Lending further credence to this assumption is the fact that two of the three girls are wearing identical patterns. At this time, especially in small and mid-sized towns in India, it wasn't uncommon for households to have matching clothes stitched from the same piece of fabric, especially for siblings to wear. Another interesting aspect of this portrait, although not obvious at first glance, is that the girls on either side are far taller than the one in the middle, who must stand on a small stool — partly concealed by the other girls’ patterned clothing — to help retain a sense of continuity across the faces in the portrait.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of two sisters) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985-87 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12212
A pair of sisters is photographed in all white as they stand shoulder to shoulder for the camera. Punjabi brings the camera to their eye level — also lowering the studio light on the right of the frame — imbuing their gaze with an adult-like gravitas. Their stiff and unnatural posture also indicates that this may have been their first time having a portrait made.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of two adolescent bridegrooms) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1987 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12241
Two minors from a village near Nagda came to Suhag Studio to commemorate and memorialise their respective weddings. Across rural and small town India, child marriage has been, and to some degree, continues to be a part of community life. The boys pictured here, likely brothers, seem to be barely teenagers, adorned in white suits with flared pants, heavy floral garlands and ornate turbans. While wedding albums were a popular choice for those who could afford them, a number of Punjabi’s clients also opted for more economical single portraits. In this case, having both boys photographed together could potentially have been a cost-saving decision.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of a boy in school uniform), Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1981 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12189
Punjabi often entertained young children and toddlers in his studio, many of whom had to be distracted by a number of toys and gestures in order to get a good portrait made. In this case, the boy who is photographed seems keenly aware of his duty as he stands to attention, wearing his school uniform and a bright smile. Judging by the composition of the image, this was likely an informal portrait commissioned by the boy’s parents.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a seated newlywed couple) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12245
Because matrimonial and ceremonial images were an aspect of Indian culture to which studio photography could easily be affixed, many of Punjabi’s portraits are celebratory in nature. This young couple — barely teenagers themselves — came to Suhag Studio to memorialise their marriage in the form of a photograph. Despite changing social attitudes, child marriage was, and to some degree still is practiced across India, especially in rural areas.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Seated portrait of two young siblings) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1980 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12219
Two pairs of remarkable, light-coloured eyes draw us into this portrait, which was likely both children's first visit to the studio. When photographing children, Punjabi would often use a number of techniques — including various toys and sounds — in order to draw their attention to his lens.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a couple holding hands) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983-84 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12215
A portrait of a young couple, in which, as Punjabi recalls, the man was from a city while the woman was from a nearby village. The assured gesture of the couple’s interloping hands contradicts the ambivalence of their respective gazes. The man looks over to the woman with the hint of a smile on his face, while she stares away and directly into the camera, expressionless. The seeming incongruity of eyes and hands here is significant when discussing Punjabi’s interest in human expressiveness as a form of photographic narrative.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Group portrait of two women) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1981 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12250
Two women, possibly sisters, pose for a portrait in ornate sarees and a slight three-quarter profile. The fact that each of them is wearing a chained nath (nose ring) implies that the image was made during an auspicious date of celebration, however, Punjabi recalls that these were in fact props from his studio.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of two boys with their goat) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12269
While some brought in their guns or their pet birds, these two young Muslim boys brought in the ceremonial goat their family was soon going to sacrifice for Bakrid. In keeping with the spirit of the festivities, the goat is itself adorned in a floral garland, while one of the boys holds it by its neck and both stare sternly into Punjabi’s camera.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (A seated family portrait) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1981 6 x 6 cm Celluloid Negative PHY.12210
This family portrait of an older couple expresses an interesting simultaneity. Both husband and wife sit in an upright posture, with their hands placed on their knees. There is a certain rigidity that runs through the image, with the tight-lipped restraint on both sitters’ faces almost mirroring the subjects of Grant Wood’s iconic painting American Gothic (1930). Also in the image are many other elements that recur in other portraits by Punjabi — the full painted backdrop, the head of a studio light and a basket-style chair peeking in from the bottom right corner.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (A display of reverence) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid Negative PHY.12257
An older man is seated on a stool, looking into the camera while his right hand is raised to bless a younger man kneeling at his feet in a show of reverence. The gesture is clearly a performance for the camera. Though it was common for such images to be made outside religious sites as souvenirs, they appear less frequently in Punjabi’s archive from within Suhag Studio. Nonetheless, its existence points to the diversity of social relations that the studio helped memorialise during this period.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Family portrait taken during a pilgrimage) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12258
While on a religious pilgrimage, a family of seven has their portrait made for posterity — where both parents are wearing floral garlands. Although such images were more common at religious sites, the sitters’ impulse to have this portrait made inside Suhag Studio points to their desire to memorialise not just the trip but also the family unit, which appears squeezed into Punjabi’s tight frame.
Every so often, an occasion warranted more than just a few photographs. For clients who had the money, one of Punjabi’s handmade photo albums was an obvious choice. Today, it shows us a fascinating extension of his creative and resourceful approach to his work.
While Punjabi’s group portraits allowed him a certain degree of creative flexibility, it was the photographs he made of individual sitters — often young people — where his technical acuity and artistic talent came through on full display.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12263
On first meeting the man photographed here, Punjabi remarked how much he resembled the actor Amitabh Bachchan. In this portrait, the man’s long legs — much like Bachchan’s — appear even longer in his flared pants. The man’s distant stare, and the peeking studio lights on either edge of the frame, add further credibility to the fiction that this man is perhaps a body double preparing himself for an actual film scene. Being one of the most recognisable of Punjabi’s individual portraits, this image also appears on the cover of scholar Christopher Pinney’s book Artisan Camera: Studio Photography from Central India (2013).
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a woman with a bunch of grapes) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1981 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12229
Although many of Punjabi’s individual clients were men, several portraits also feature women posing alone, bringing similar references into the studio. In this photograph, a young woman holds a bunch of grapes up to her face, lit softly by Punjabi’s lighting arrangement — clearly rehearsing a visual trope popularised by the advent of Bollywood and the language of Hindi films that preceded it in the 1950s, 60s and 70s.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Staged portrait of a man with a liquor bottle) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12222
The aggrieved and brooding drinker — almost always a man — was a common and highly recognisable motif in Hindi films from this period. The sitter here deliberately mimics that trope, resting his head and arm on a table as his gaze is turned towards the left of the frame, where an opened bottle of fake liquor rests next to a small bowl. In his hand is a half-empty glass, which he tilts towards his face in introspection. As is common in Punjabi’s filmic arrangements, the man is illuminated from the top left of the frame, lending a soft glow to his face. In addition to being nakedly theatrical, these images are also highly attuned to the visual culture they’re referencing.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a seated man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1984 6 x 6 cm Celluloid Negative PHY.12208
An old man is photographed in a white shirt and dhoti (unstitched sarong worn by men), which are accentuated by the light that falls on him. As with many of Punjabi’s portraits, the source of this light also peeks in from the top right of the frame, reminding us — albeit unintentionally — of the architecture behind each of his photographic setups. As Punjabi recalls, this portrait was intended to be framed by the man’s family after his death, and has experienced light damage on its edges over time.
Personality & the Self
It wouldn’t be far-fetched to assume that the man standing in a three-piece suit with flared trousers and his hands on his hips knows he resembles a young Amitabh Bachchan; or that the woman holding a cluster of grapes to her face is deliberately imitating a popular filmic trope. Though distinct in their setup, what unites these portraits is the dialogue that produced them.
Although always behind the camera, these photographic arrangements also carry bits of Punjabi in them, as he frequently helped clients create poses inspired by the language of dreams and cinema as well as their own disposition. Each image expresses a distinct style of playful formality, somewhere between the conviction of performance and the irregularity of rehearsal.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983-84 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12205
The shallow focus on the man’s pensive face and the soft studio light that illuminates it makes this one of Punjabi’s most evocative portraits. The three-quarter view — old as portraiture itself — also finds its way into many of his photographic arrangements, especially with individual sitters.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983-84 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12207
Punjabi’s characteristic three-quarter view and shallow depth of field reappear in this portrait, in which the sitter is photographed in a crisp white shirt and neatly combed hair. Although this may have been too stylised for a professional portrait, it’s quite possible this was either a personal memento or an image made with the intention of acquiring arranged marriage proposals.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12209
In a pose inspired by the cinematic visual tropes of the time, a man is framed against the background wall of the studio, with his back towards the camera and his face turned sharply in profile. The posture — almost a reverse three-quarter view — accentuates the angles of his nose and chin, illuminated from behind. This is also one of the portraits that Punjabi retouched using a pencil, giving the man a wrinkle-free complexion.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a boy) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12218
Likely in his early teenage years, the boy in this portrait sits relaxed and smiling in a three-quarter view facing his right, with a raised shoulder that ever so slightly angles his upper body away from the camera. Due to the stylisation of the portrait and his young age, it’s quite possible that this image was not made for a strictly professional purpose.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12254
In a pose clearly inspired by Hindi cinema, the subject appears pensive, photographed in profile with his head tilting upward and in the direction of the studio light that illuminates part of his face. The light is soft, and the way it falls on him combines light and shadow to give the image added dimensionality. The faint glow achieved by the portrait overall is deeply reminiscent of the lighting techniques used in films from Punjabi’s early childhood.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12253
Photographed in a crisp white shirt with slicked back hair, the man in profile is the central figure of one of Punjabi’s most evocative individual portraits. In a possible emulation of a filmic visual trope, the man appears deeply contemplative — almost emotional — as his face angles sideways and upwards, in the direction of the light that softly illuminates it. As is obvious from the framing, this image is less interested in capturing or representing the man’s face and more in the mood its tilt suggests.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man in sunglasses) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1986 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12248
The language of films is evident in this photograph, like many of Punjabi’s single portraits, in which a young man, wearing prop sunglasses and a popular hairstyle, angles his torso to the left while facing rightward. The twisting posture accentuates the man’s jawline, which is further underscored by Punjabi’s lighting. Portraits such as these allowed Punjabi to present his sitters in an almost statuesque fashion.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1986-87 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12221
With a head full of thick hair and a dark mustache lining his upper lip, the subject in this portrait purses his lips, frowns and slouches while facing his left in three-quarter view. The image is noticeably darker than many of Punjabi’s other individual portraits, with the studio light seeming to illuminate mainly the man’s contemplative face.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Half-length portrait of a woman) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985-86 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12185
The image demands a double take. Was this woman photographed before she had finished posing, or is the positioning of her hand on her face deliberate? Nonetheless, the gesture — matched with the expression of irritation that moves down from her eyebrows — lends the portrait a distinct sense of performativity, even rehearsal — as if the final image selected was a different one, and this iteration was somehow left behind in Punjabi’s collection of negatives.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a woman with her hair undone) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12237
In a distinctly theatrical posture, the young woman looks left and tilts her body to the right, her long hair cascading and her right hand placed on her left shoulder, as if taking an oath. A widely recognised symbol of beauty in Hindi cinema (and much of Indian cinema, overall), long hair plays a similar role in this portrait as it lends a sense of romance and dreaminess to the softly lit and contemplative image.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a seated girl) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1987 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12261
In this stylised individual portrait, a girl is seated on Punjabi’s basket-style chair with her head and upper body facing the left side of the frame. Though we cannot see her entirely, looking at the frills on the sleeve of her blouse, one can surmise that she came to the studio well-dressed. Punjabi’s lighting illuminates her face in profile, highlighting her nose ring and hairpin as well. The girl’s bemused expression is perhaps an inadvertent response to Punjabi’s directions.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a seated woman) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1980 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12268
A photograph of a woman, taken inside Suhag Studio. Dressed in white, she leans her head on her arm, which is positioned on a chair to the left of the frame. Her eyes look directly at the camera. The portrait, like many other Punjabi made of individual sitters, emulates a popular film trope, where the woman might imagine herself as the protagonist under the bright studio lights and the camera’s gaze. Such a self-aware sense of performance was common for many of Punjabi’s clients.
Punjabi’s childhood also coincided with the waning years of the Golden Era of Hindi Cinema, which he regularly drew inspiration from when developing his own style later on. Take for instance, a concluding scene from Guru Dutt’s cult classic Pyaasa (1957), which stirred Punjabi’s imagination at a young age.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a seated man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12185
This portrait deliberately imitates a style of introspection common to the visual language of Hindi films in the second half of the twentieth century. Light and shadow were used to great effect in moderating the emotional temperament of the films from this period, where they added depth to the character’s internality and signaled dramatic turns in the plot involving revelations, surprises and confessions. The studio light cast on this sitter’s face comes in from his left and softens the hard angles of his cheekbones and nose.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nadga, Madhya Pradesh
1983 8.9 x 11.7 cm Hand-coloured silver gelatin print PHY.12169
Imitating a classic filmic trope, a man is photographed in profile, with his head turned slightly upward, illuminated by the studio light while the rest of his face is in shadow. Punjabi, as well as his sitters, were very familiar with the visual language of cinema at the time, and photographs such as these –– which used light and shadow to express a contemplative and serious mood –– were client favorites.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a woman) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12239
Punjabi’s use of lighting to obscure parts of the face and adds depth to others — inspired in part by films such as Pyaasa — come in full display in this portrait, which was commissioned by the woman to acquire wedding proposals. The woman in the image rests her head against the table in front of her, with her chin supported by her overlapping hands as she tilts her head slightly to the right. She’s wearing earrings and both her wrists are adorned by bangles, which could possibly be props from the studio. In the shine on her face produced from Punjabi’s lighting arrangement, the portrait’s mood embodies the internality of its subject.
Thought to be dead, an aggrieved Urdu poet arrives at his own memorial service and renounces a world that saw no value in his work. Seeing the dramatic potential in this encounter — a pivotal scene in Pyaasa's final act — Dutt deepens its pathos with lighting and shadow. Punjabi carries this into his work, where he takes a painterly approach to light and its capacity to conceal and reveal character. In both cases, an undeniably human tension emerges. Faces partially concealed by darkness register a greater internal conflict between an actual and an imagined life, where a sturdy reality pushes up against a desire for transcendence.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man posing with a telephone) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12228
A landline telephone makes an appearance in this individual portrait that features a slender young man pretending to be preoccupied for the camera. Apparent in the photograph is the sitter’s desire to associate himself with the sense of modernity and connectivity that the telephone — regardless of who is on the other side — symbolises.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of a man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1985 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12226
The man in this portrait asked Punjabi to make him look like a “bold, rich man.” Incidentally, the resulting posture also appears to be an homage to the film posters of the time, wherein the hero’s stance signified dominance and style. The raised left leg accentuates the spread of the man’s flared trousers, while his prop sunglasses and long hair convey a confidence and nonchalance characteristic of much filmic imagery, especially in representations of men. From Punjabi’s angle, the studio light that stands well into the frame — meant to be cropped out later — both exposes the man’s performance while also making his stardom plausible, if only for a moment.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man holding his pet bird) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1987 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12230
On entering Suhag Studio, the man in this portrait had one simple request for Punjabi: to be photographed with his beloved pet bird. In the resulting image, the man appears in flared trousers, thick-rimmed glasses and a rounded hat, leaning on a stool as his bird sits on his left index finger. In a bid to further accentuate the man’s lean, Punjabi tilts his camera to his right when taking the image, causing the painted background to appear slanted.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a young tea seller) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1987 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12242
While many came to Punjabi with the hope of enacting the role of a film hero, others brought in a different set of influences. Working outside Suhag Studio selling tea, this boy was photographed by Punjabi in a highly stylised way, mimicking the temperament of a cinematic villain. The sunglasses, scarf and unlit cigarette — likely all props — contribute to this overall effect and lend a certain swagger to the thin boy’s leaning posture.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of a young man) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1983-84 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12194
Photographed inside Suhag Studio, the lights facing the subject accentuate the brightness of his stylish white attire. In a theatrical moment, he folds his left arm behind his ear and intently looks away from the camera.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Full-length portrait of a young man) Suhag Studio, Nagda Madhya Pradesh
1984-86 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12211
This portrait was made for the purpose of soliciting a marriage proposal, for which this young man from a nearby village wanted to be photographed dressed as “an Englishman.” The inclusion of flared pants and a long tie (likely Punjabi’s) accentuate his slender physique, while the white glow of his clothes is further brightened by two studio lights, both visible on the left side of the frame. Because the portrait is quite explicitly intended to impress, the choice to appear like an Englishman as a marker of sophistication is one of many instances throughout Punjabi’s archive in which the sitter’s preferences reveal an underlying set of cultural codes popular at the time.
The language of cinema had a significant impact on Punjabi, but it was still part of a larger constellation of influences. His work also captured how people from a fast-industrialising town – outside but never delinked from India’s urban centres – articulated their evolving ambitions and self-conceptions; where a particular posture or prop could reveal a host of personal preferences and worldviews.
Punjabi recalls this young man asking for a portrait that would make him look like a “smart, gentleman photographer.” The magazine, camera and tie featured in this image are all props, demonstrating Punjabi’s effort to meet his client’s expectations.
Magazines appear frequently in many of Punjabi’s portraits, where they express a certain urbane and sophisticated form of indulgence that was an important cultural signifier for India’s emerging middle class. Typically, this prop magazine was just whatever was lying around in the studio — often an issue of an entertainment magazine such as Bombay Screen or Mayapuri, from which Punjabi also drew visual inspiration.
The Japanese Yashica — presumably Punjabi’s — slung on this man’s shoulder was a pricey piece of equipment that didn’t typically circulate beyond urban markets. Its existence in this portrait speaks to the sitter’s desire for 'smartness,' expressing a degree of professional acuity as well as socioeconomic mobility and access.
Although Suhag Studio was certainly a microcosm of social and cultural life in Nagda, no account of its history would be complete without the photographs Punjabi made when he was away from his counter and traversing his town on foot, camera in tow.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man under a banyan tree) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12264
In one of Punjabi’s few outdoor individual portraits, a man is dressed in a suit, looking contemplatively to the sky as he poses for a portrait under a banyan tree. Despite being outdoors, Punjabi is still able to use natural light to his advantage, as the man’s body is shaded under the canopy of the tree while sunlight leaks in from the edges of the frame.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Women and children in front of a Hindu deity’s statue) Suhag Studio, Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1980 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12188
On the occasion of their young child’s birthday, this family commissioned Punjabi for a photograph at Badrivishal Temple in Nagda. At the time, it was not uncommon to find photographers waiting on the steps of local religious and tourist sites offering visitors a chance to memorialise their devotion through souvenir images such as this one. The tradition predates Punjabi — the Rajasthani artist Khubiram Gopilal, for instance, used a mix of painting and photography to create popular adaptations of devotional manorath (mind’s vehicle; desire) paintings for clients around the 1920s.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Four men stand in front of a truck) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12256
In one of many images Punjabi made outside his studio, a group of five men pose near a truck in Nagda, which is decorated with lights and flowers to commemorate Diwali. One of the men is hanging off the passenger side of the vehicle, though it is unclear whether he is its owner. Punjabi often ventured out into town with his camera and took photographs of everything from upturned vehicles for insurance claims to mass processions for funerals of important local figures.
Outside the Studio
After exploring how Nagda leaked into Suhag Studio, we turn to the instances when Punjabi ventured out onto nearby streets and remote villages, into temples and bars and through wedding processions and funerals. Having started out working weddings, Punjabi had become a keen-eyed and quick-footed photographer, rarely without a camera when the moment demanded it.
These outdoor images provide a crucial bridge between the regulated and consciously arranged dreamworld within the walls of his studio and the teeming human drama of everyday life just outside its doors. They create a vivid portrait of a time and place both unique in Punjabi’s vision and part of a much larger national idea — not Nagda as India, but Nagda as one of many Indias.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man dancing during a wedding baraat) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1980 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12193
The subject does not see the bright flash of Punjabi’s camera as he dances energetically alongside the wedding band and many guests at his friend’s wedding. A good wedding photographer must be invisible. Punjabi’s knack for framing an image inconspicuously and at the right moment reflects in a number of his outdoor photographs, especially of ceremonial events.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man dancing during a wedding baraat) Unhel, Madhya Pradesh
1980 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12192
During a wedding in the nearby village of Unhel, a man’s arms stretch across the width of the frame, as other young men line up behind him in a dancing procession, followed by the groom on horseback in the dark background of the image. By the time he opened his studio, Punjabi had been photographing weddings for roughly a decade. Despite the formal requirements of such photography, Punjabi’s interest in posture and facial expressions still comes through.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Group portrait of men with cigarettes) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12267
In one of Punjabi’s more crowded outdoor photographs, made at a local wedding, a number of men huddle around a bench at night, exchanging cigarettes, gestures and conversation. Nearly all of them are dressed in white, leading one to believe that they may have all been at the same event prior to — or even during — the point at which this image was made. In the background of the image, written in large Hindi letters on the back of a small wooden shack are the words: “The country’s leader, Indira Gandhi.” The 1970s and early 80s were a tumultuous time for the nation, primarily due to Gandhi’s imposition of a state of emergency from 1975-77. This image was made after the state of emergency and before Gandhi’s assasination in 1984.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Portrait of a child holding a telephone) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1988 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12186
Holding the receiver of a small rotary telephone to his ear, a boy pretends to be on a call while posing for Punjabi’s camera. Such telephones — signalling the private ownership of modern technology — reappear across Punjabi’s archive.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Bridegroom is fed sweets on his horse) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12195
The image is one of Punjabi’s many busy outdoor compositions, this time during a wedding procession in which a girl extends her arm and feeds the groom a sweet, marking the auspicious event. The photograph almost seems planned, with the groom deliberately looking at the camera, implying an effort to preserve this particular moment.
SURESH PUNJABI
Untitled (Man with a table fan) Nagda, Madhya Pradesh
1979 6 x 6 cm Celluloid negative PHY.12185
During what appears to be a local raffle, a seated announcer addresses the crowd while, next to him, a man holds a table fan that he appears to have just won. Punjabi deliberately squeezes nearby onlookers into the frame, creating a sense of busyness that characterises many of his outdoor photographs.
Looking beyond the local context of Nagda, we see that the trajectory of photography in India was comparable with many other countries around the world. This begs the question: could Punjabi’s portraits have parallels elsewhere? What might we gain from placing him in global dialogue with other studio photographers outside India?
SURESH PUNJABI
Artwork title
Suresh Punjabi, Midnight (Horizon), 2020, Acrylic on cotton blotting paper, 132 cm × 97 cm (51-15/16" × 38-3/16"), unframed 140.4 cm × 103.9 cm × 5.3 cm (55-1/4" × 40-7/8" × 2-1/16"), framed
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Global Contexts
Across the Global South, photography studios have historically been steeped in a particular kind of elite, colonial legacy, but as the medium became more accessible over time, they also became spaces for great experimentation and artistry. After the wave of decolonisation that swept much of Asia and Africa in the mid-twentieth century, a new era of studio photographers emerged, who engaged deeply with the distinct social contexts in which they worked and lived.
In looking for Punjabi’s Nagda elsewhere, three photographers stand out as particularly interesting points of contact: Hashem El Madani (1928–2017) from Lebanon, Malick Sidibé (1935–2016) from Mali and Pornsak Sakdaenprai (1938–) from Thailand. Considering Punjabi’s work alongside them, we can better appreciate the aesthetic and ethical concern they all shared: an abiding respect and faithfulness towards community and place.
Running Studio Shehrazade in his home city of Sidon, Hashem El Madani dedicated much of his fifty-year career — starting in 1948 — to photographing nearly all its residents, including through the Lebanese Civil War. During this time, it wasn’t uncommon for him to encourage his sitters to use props he had bought for his studio, a practice that he shared with Punjabi, whose images were often also furnished with prop ties, sunglasses, cameras, bottles and magazines. In this pair of images, Madani’s sitter, a young boy named Muwafaq el Rawas, pretends to turn the knobs on a radio, while Punjabi’s sitters, two unnamed men, pose holding a smaller transistor radio — the first in Nagda — up to their ears. In responding to the fervor for new technologies in Sidon and Nagda, both photographers were able to bring various objects, and the cultural capital they exhibited at the time, into their photographic arrangements.
Left image: Untitled, Suresh Punjabi. Right image: Akram Zaatari. Objects of study, The archive of Studio Shehrazade, Hashem El Madani: Studio Practices. 2007. Muwafaq el Rawas, now a Sheikh. Madani’s parents’ home, the studio, Saida, Lebanon, 1948-53. Hashem el Madani Collection. Courtesy of the Arab Image Foundation, Beirut.
Malick Sidibé opened his studio in Bamako two years after Mali gained independence from French rule in 1960. There, he quickly became renowned for his carefully arranged portraits and nightlife photographs. Like Punjabi, he was a fixture in the community he photographed and paid special attention to the way Bamako’s youth responded to an increasingly authoritarian regime at home and Western cultural influences from abroad. In these two images, using the characteristic sense of performance that informed both photographers’ work, two men, on opposite sides of the world and a decade apart, prop up their right leg, put a hand on their hip and strike a pose.
Left image: Untitled, Suresh Punjabi. Right image: Malick Sidibé.
Pornsak Sakdaenprai opened a small studio in the rural Phimai district in the northeast of Thailand in 1958 and began photographing his surrounding community there at a time when the countryside had begun rapidly integrating with urban centres. Similar to many of Punjabi’s group portraits, Sakdaenprai’s work captures the personal aspirations and sense of camaraderie between the villagers who frequented his studio and brought in their own aesthetic and cultural interests. In this pair of portraits, both photographers capture a set of friends whose poses express a discernible formality as well as an undeniable warmth.
Left image: Untitled, Suresh Punjabi. Right image: Pornsak Sakdaenprai — courtesy Kathmandu Photo Gallery (Bangkok).
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Now in his early 60s, Punjabi remembers the studio work he did in those early decades with a sense of fondness and gratitude. Many of his earliest sitters, now much older too, continue to cherish his portraits of them, which occupy living room and office walls, albums and wallets and an assortment of paperwork. Without Punjabi's hard work, and the love and support he received from the community he photographed, this archive would not exist today.
Looking Back
Despite the collaborative nature of his work, many of the years compressed in this archive were also made up of quiet moments alone — just Punjabi and his negatives. Whenever he wasn’t sleeping or eating, he was at the studio. On most days he opened shop at ten in the morning, working the counter before retouching images through the afternoon. By evening, his shutters came down but his work continued.
On some nights, when the central Indian summer packed his studio with dry heat, Punjabi reopened these shutters to let some cool air in, if only for a moment. Some early mornings, he took his camera out for a stroll, photographing the local temple, the empty streets and the rising sun — always trying something new. Looking back, he recalls the feeling that kept him going all those years...
“I was never lonely. Through these mute photographs, this town slowly started to become my family. We were having a conversation that needed no words.”
Suresh Punjabi is born in Indore, Madhya Pradesh, and is one of six children in his large family.
The Golden Era of Hindi Cinema begins to wane, as films from this era — such as Guru Dutt’s Pyaasa (1957) — continue to inspire the imaginations of thousands, including Punjabi.
Pyaasa poster; courtesy: Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru.
1960
India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru passes away, but the system of economic modernisation he established after India’s independence continues to impact the growth of cities and towns such as Indore and Nagda. The resulting policies also benefit Punjabi’s father, who experiences financial success as a construction contractor and the manager of a rice mill.
Jawaharlal Nehru by Yousuf Karsh; courtesy: Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru.
1964
At the age of twelve, Punjabi begins receiving informal photography lessons from Srichand ji, the owner of Ajanta Studio in his neighbourhood — one of many photography studios in Indore at the time. He also studies the work of these other studios and begins practicing on his father’s AGFA Click III film camera.
1969
Punjabi buys his first professional grade camera on a trip to Bombay (now Mumbai): a dual-format, twin-lens reflex (TLR) Yashica-635. Over the next few years, he develops his skill in portraiture and outdoor photography, travelling across rural and urban Madhya Pradesh, and at times assisting businesses such as Ajanta Studio with their wedding photography work.
1971
Prompted by sudden and significant losses to his father’s businesses, Punjabi decides to become a professional photographer to supplement his family’s income. He markets his service under the name S. Punjabi and moves to the industrialising town of Nagda near Indore, working as a travelling wedding photographer. His move to Nagda during this time proves deeply significant as he spends the next four decades (and counting) documenting the lives of the people there.
1974
In June, then-prime minister Indira Gandhi — Nehru’s daughter — declares a state of emergency across India, which lasts until March, 1977. A highly consequential event in India’s post-Independence history, the Emergency begins to change many Indian citizens’ relationship to the state, of which the administrative work of studio photographers such as Punjabi is a part.
1975
At the age of twenty-two, and after building a reliable clientele through his travelling work, Punjabi opens Suhag Studio on Jawahar Marg in Nagda. The small 10 x 20 feet studio provides a range of services, including wedding photography and albums.
Suhag Studio business card; courtesy: Suresh Punjabi's private collection.
1979
In December, Punjabi marries Rita Manchandani, with whom he continues to live in Nagda.
1985
Punjabi continues to gain the recognition and respect of his community and has his first child, Rupali Punjabi, in August.
India undergoes economic liberalisation and becomes more service and market oriented, increasing the amount of foreign and private investment and reducing import tariffs and taxes. Punjabi shifts to a more affordable 35mm film format. Additionally, he begins using a digital camera — a Canon — and also purchases a digital printer, one of the first among the photography studios of Nagda. In the summer, he has his second child, Pratik Punjabi.
Pratik and Sureshi Punjabi; courtesy: Suresh Punjabi's private collection.
1991
A monsoon storm strikes Nagda, flooding the town and almost destroying thousands of Punjabi’s film negatives stored in Suhag Studio. Helped by British scholar Christopher Pinney, Punjabi is able to recover nearly 50,000 of his negatives.
2008
As part of the Delhi Photo Festival, an exhibition of Punjabi’s photographs is organised at the Art Heritage Gallery, New Delhi. Pinney publishes Artisan Camera: Studio Photography from Central India (Tara Books), featuring photographs by Punjabi.
Book cover for Artisan Camera: Studio Photography in Central India; courtesy: Tara Books.
2013
After a few months in Melbourne, Australia, Punjabi’s son Pratik joins Suhag Studio, assisting his father in the photography business and expanding its technological scope.
2015
Punjabi inaugurates a larger space for Suhag Studio, not far from its original location. Faces: The Portrait Studios in India and Georgia, an exhibition that presents Punjabi’s portraits alongside those of the Georgian photographer Shalva Alkhanaidze, opens at the Tbilisi Photo Festival in September and travels to the India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, in November. It is co-curated by Pinney and Nestan Nijaradze, the co-founder and artistic director of the Tbilisi Photography and Multimedia Museum, Georgia.
2017
Punjabi’s photographs are featured in Photography in India: A Visual History from the 1850s to the Present (Prestel), a survey of the hundred most influential photographers in India, written by Nathaniel Gaskell and Diva Gujral.
Book cover for Photography in India: A Visual History from the 1850s to the Present; courtesy: Prestel.
2018
Suresh Punjabi gifts his archive to the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru, where the images are conserved and the negatives cleaned and remastered by V. Karthik from Inspire Madras. Punjabi’s work also appears in an installation at the Chennai Photo Biennale. He continues managing Suhag Studio.
2019
Essays
The Business of Dreams: Photographs from the Studio of Suresh Punjabi
By Varun Nayar
Read more about Suresh Punjabi — his upbringing, influences and the portraits he produced at Suhag Studio in Nagda, Madhya Pradesh, in the 1970s and 80s. In connecting his work to the popular culture of the time, ongoing political shifts and the personal aspirations of his sitters, this essay explores Punjabi’s community-focused approach to photography and the way he ran his studio business.
Interior Worlds: The Legacy of Studio Photography in India
By Varun Nayar
A detailed history of studio photography in India, moving from the colonial to the postcolonial to the contemporary. In tracing this evolution, this essay brings to light the intersection of commercial interests, power relations and changing sociopolitical attitudes that have defined and redefined photography’s role in the country.
Credits & Acknowledgements
This exhibition has been curated by Nathaniel Gaskell and Varun Nayar.
Nathaniel Gaskell is a curator, writer and director of the MAP Academy, and the former director of the Tasveer Gallery. He is the author of Photography in India: A Visual History from the 1850s to the Present (Prestel, 2018), and the editor of several other books on photography in Asia, including William Dalrymple’s The Historian’s Eye (HarperCollins India, 2018), Derry Moore’s In the Shadow of the Raj (Prestel, 2017), Karan Kapoor’s Time & Tide and Hikari: Contemporary Photography from Japan (Tasveer, 2016). He received a BA in Fine Art from the Arts University College, Bournemouth, and an MRes in Cultural Studies from the London Consortium. He lives between Bangalore and Singapore.
Varun Nayar is a writer, editor and researcher from Delhi. He is the research editor at MAP Academy, Bengaluru, and a fellow at the international literary magazine Words Without Borders. He received his MLitt in Postcolonial and World Literatures at the University of St Andrews, Scotland, prior to which he worked in magazine journalism in the United States.
We would like to thank and acknowledge those who have also played a key role in making the project possible: Suresh Punjabi, for his generosity, time and patience with our questions, as well as Pratik Punjabi and the rest of the team at Suhag Studio; Naveed Mulki, from the Faraway Originals film team; V. Karthik from Inspire Madras for his expertise in cleaning, caring for and capturing the original negatives and digital films, and to Abdul Rahiman for his assistance in post-processing; Samina Irani at HelpGrid for her translation assistance; at the MAP Academy, Siddharth Gandotra for his research assistance, Pooja Savansukha and Shrey Maurya for their editorial support and Ashwati Franklin for further editing and proofreading; at the Museum of Art & Photography (MAP), Bengaluru, Prachi Gupta for her assistance in collections research.
We also acknowledge the work of scholar Christopher Pinney and his collaborations with institutions and galleries such as The Alkazi Foundation for the Arts and Art Heritage, which first brought Punjabi’s work into public discourse and created a foundation upon which this exhibition hopes to build a sustained conversation.
Afterword
What’s in a face? And what does it mean for us to look at these faces in particular, in this context, decades after the fact? Organised through a constant and open dialogue with Suresh Punjabi, the intent behind The Business of Dreams is not simply to present a selection of remarkable studio portraits from an ‘earlier’ India, but to engage with the social and material worlds from which they’ve emerged. In addition to being a subject, each face registers the possibility of many other narratives in which the photographic moment, and our distant and belated viewing of it, plays only a small part.
The further away curators and scholars are from the context of the work being exhibited, the greater the risk of generalising its subjects. This archive raises an important ethical question: how do we convey the individual agency of each sitter while also grasping at a larger understanding of Punjabi’s life and work over the decades? In part, the answer is to know what we don’t know, and explicitly bring that partiality into our approach. In rejecting a strictly anthropological mode, the exhibition encourages a degree of speculation – from the curators as well as Punjabi – over how each work might be mediated and annotated. While our curatorial voice is never absent (if it ever can be), its intervention is focused on bringing varied references and sources into the exhibitionary space; none claiming authority but each attempting to open up new, and at times contradictory, avenues of engagement.
The image is not a fixed or self-contained unit of historical argument. Acknowledging this has meant exhibiting Punjabi’s archive through the various exchanges and relations it makes visible across images, as opposed to treating each as a distinct photographic ‘object.’ The presumed facticity of, say, a certain prop appearing in a particular photograph is constantly interrupted by the value the sitter ascribes to it – whether personal, social or commercial. Our decision to highlight the multiplicity of these exchanges was inspired by Punjabi’s own approach to the studio as a place of community and convergence, not containment; where the sitter co-produces the final image. Before the disarticulation of photography in the twenty-first century, this community-focused approach was commonplace in thousands of studios across small and mid-sized towns in India, but has rarely been included in discussions about the country’s photographic history.
“A good exhibition is never the last word on its subject,” writes the American artist, scholar and curator Robert Storr. Presenting Punjabi’s archive in the manner that we have is undeniably an act of selection – and so, intervention – but our treatment remains committed to producing a necessary point of departure, and arguing for a wider and more inclusive view of photography in the country. If each face tells a story, then this exhibition is a patchwork of people, personal histories, social contexts, references and influences, each refracted through the world Suhag Studio has built.