SANJHA

"... I was fed up with the noise, the pollution and the rubbish.
In the twilight I found peace by cutting the reality
so that it became quiet and beautiful for myself..."

From interview with Nicolai Klingenberg - My Pleasure

PICTURES FROM A CAULDRON
The first time my family and I went to Goa in India three years ago to visit family, I was overwhelmed by the tempo and soundimagery. I had an immediate and ignorant notion about this place being filled with calmness and balance. But the tourism is the way of living and people have to work hard to survive. The first trip with bus was an intense experience with speed, noise, technomusic, honking and stress. We were all exhausted and a bit shocked by the impressions from the ride afterwards. But at the same time, in the middle of this inferno, we experienced the locals sitting, taking a nap and a breather from their daily chores – pristined by the tempo and soundlevel.

We went to Goa again in the winter of 2013. At that time I was down with stress, and it was therefore quite a challenge to be in a place like that, when all I needed was peace. Could I learn something from these immediate superficial considerations concerning the locals relaxed sense of being in the middle of chaos? Had they developed an ability that I just hadn’t acquired or was it a scary symbol of mankinds ability to adjust to just about anything?

My exit and entrance was the photography. The pictures soon became my calmness. When dusk arrived I found the silence I needed protected by the darkness – in the alleys, and the urban landscape and in the pruning of the visually overwhelming and packed reality. The pictures in the Sanjha series is about the sacred place I was seeking and found in chaos.