Dhalday Sufnay: Old vs new captured in photographs

Six photographers try to highlight fading cultural values.

LAHORE: A five-day photography exhibition titled ‘Dhalday Sufnay’ or fading connections featuring the work of six photographers is under way at the Punjab Institution of Language, Art and Culture (PILAC).

Photographers Abdul Waris Hameed, Amna Yaseen, Ghazanfar Bhinder, Muhammad Saeed Rao, Umair Ghani and Zaheer Chaudhry have put their photos on display on a myriad of printing mediums, highlighting fading cultural values in the wake of reckless urbanisation and economic disparities.

The exhibit is themed around the concept of time, cultural dichotomies between the new and old and the contrast one feels while experiencing the new world and the past.



According to Umair, his work is about the customs and rituals, which are always in the phase of transition.

“Things remain the same just for a period of time before a transition happens,” he says. “Dhalday Sufnay can be understood as ‘fading connections’ which now exist in a photograph as a documentation of human memories, giving us a summary of how life used to be at that particular time, as opposed to how it is today.”

Amna says her work is about the time that has passed, juxtaposed with the present. “I see and photograph imprints of the past and their relation with the present,” she says.

The photographer’s one picture displays a person who no more lives while the other one depicts an old man holding his own picture when he was young, and has managed to keep that old cultural system and value that he grew up with alive.

Abdul Waris says in the fast-moving scenario of life, photography is an art to seize a moment. “It is about observing a moment and preserving it for the time to come while everything around it perishes,” he says. “A photograph gives the reflection of eternal life while the reality fades away.”

Zaheer says that against loud and crowded cities, silent silhouettes have much to narrate. “I use my camera to visually narrate stories about these fading characters, which helped define my ‘fading connections’.”

The exhibition, which also features discussions, will end on April 17.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 15^th, 2017.