Project 365 is a collaborative photography project recording the cultural changes in the holy city of Tiruvannamalai, located 200 kilometers from Chennai (Tamil Nadu, India) on the hills of Annamalai. For one year, from August 2014 to July 2015, 50 photographers have been invited by the project’s creator, Abul Kalam Azad, to document daily life in this historic and religious site.
Overlooked by an extinct volcano, Mount Arunachala, local legend has it that Shiva appeared there in a column of fire. Every year throughout the country, during full moons in November and December, the Karthikai Deepam festival celebrates the myth, first and foremost in Tiruvannamalai, where more than a million pilgrims flock to pay tribute to Shiva.
The city of 150,000 is the home to the Temple of Annamalaiyar and the ashram of famous Indian guru Ramana Maharshi. A pilgrimage site overseen beginning in the 19th century by the Chola dynasty, Tiruvannamalai has been documented throughout its history. In the 20th century, the English extensively photographed the site, and Henri Cartier-Bresson was on hand to cover Maharshi’s funeral in 1950.
In 2010, Abul Kalam Azad, a Indian photojournalist from Kerala, moved to Tiruvannamalai and began to archive the photographs he took in the 1990s. In 2013, he created the Ekalokam Trust for Photography (EtP), an organization for the preservation and promotion of the photographic heritage of the city. Launched in August 2014, Project 365 aims to document different aspects of daily life in Tiruvannamalai and its surroundings. Photographers may work on any theme they wish. The only instructions are to use film photography or vintage development processes.
Read the full article on the French version of L’Oeil.
EXHIBITION
Project 365
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