Sunil Gupta’s Out and About: New York and New Delhi examines the gay and lesbian communities of two major cities. It runs through December 20th and is being presented by SepiaEye.
In 1976, Gupta spent a year in an MBA program in New York. Finding himself more interested in photography than management, he took workshops at the New School. There he met Lisette Model, who encouraged him to become a photographer, and quickly found his subject: the New York gay community, which had just begun entering the public space at a time when America was still puritanical in many ways. The series Christopher Street (1976) follows men who unabashedly display their difference on the streets of Greenwich Village. AIDS had not yet struck, and sexual liberation was underway. The subjects are relaxed. Couples stroll through the streets, chatting, meeting up at street corners and neighborhood bars. Gupta’s photographs communicate a feeling a freedom, which he felt in his own life.
In the 1980s, Gupta produced a series of color photographs, Exiles, showing anonymous gay men in Delhi. At the time, the Delhi gay community had to remain hidden for fear of imprisonment. After 35 years away, Gupta returned to his hometown for the more outspoken series Mr. Malhotra’s Party.
Read the full article on the French version of L’Oeil.
EXHIBITION
Sunil Gupta : Out and About: New York and New Delhi
Through December 20th 2014
SepiaEYE
547 West 27th Street, #608
New York, NY 10001
United States
www.sepiaeye.com
http://www.sunilgupta.net
