https://www.aratikumarrao.com/sundarbans
Arati Kumar-Rao’s photos shows eye opening aspects of the “slow violence” of environmental damage. Looking at her photos in the video and on her website, it shows the reality for many that depend on nature to survive and the effects of the actions of other people who turn a blind eye. Arati’s pictures of both humans and nature are taken in a way that emphasizes that they coexist and are codependent. Her use of natural light and shadows begs for the stories of the subjects of the photos and make the onlooker question why. Why are these people constantly displaced? Why do they then have to sell off their children? Why is the environment retaliating? Arati’s photos is oddly silent and still just like nature in the face of our questions. Its silence is like a confirmation, that we humans have silenced it. The composition of her photos engages the audience to imagine themselves in the plague that nature is facing in the modern world. The power that her message holds is in itself resilience that sends a message from the people that are suffering from the irresponsibility that led to global warming to those that stand by… both the watchers and the helpless.
The photography of the environmental waste and its damage to the affected people is really saddening. Thank you for researching this.