“A dreamer by profession, a cook by passion, the mission is travel”

Sankar Sarkar is an associate with Drik India and Majority World, UK. His empathetic pictures radiate intimacy, vividness and emotion, and many of them – at second glance – ask hidden questions.

Sankar Sarkar, your portfolio is overflowing with powerful images of people, captured in moments of intimacy. How do you approach your subjects?

The easiest way to approach people is to first start a quick, friendly conversation with them – gain their trust by connecting with their lives, and by opening up yourself to them. Once people trust you, your work gets easier. Sometimes people say no to me, but I keep the conversation alive, to let people know that my interest in them is sincere. In the end, they either change their minds and allow me to take pictures, or else I move on to the next subject.

Speaking of intimacy – since the year 2000, you have been working on a photo project to portray your mother, who was trafficked to become a sex worker when you were only a child. Can you tell us a little bit about Facing one’s own?

Facing one’s own reflects the dialogue with my mother through my camera. My mother and I used to belong at different poles. She was trafficked to Sethbagan from Malkangiri in the state of Orissa where I was born, and became a sex worker. In search of my mother, I came to Kolkata with my grandmother. Initially, it was a stage of alienation for both of us, my mother, Kavita, and myself. Photography, in fact, re-united us, thus I call it a dialogue through the camera. I didn’t like her profession and that was an obvious aspect, but gradually I realized the fragile relationship could be strong – the more I take photographs of my mother, the more I can overcome the alienation. It’s challenging for a son, who is not an ‘outsider’, taking pictures of his mother, and it’s me who – as a son taking pictures of all oddities – is breaking stigma and taboo. Likewise, as an insider, it was a really challenging job to work at the locality where I live, and particularly taking photographs of my mother was a tremendously difficult task: ‘facing one’s own’. The interpersonal relationship with my mother to date is complicated. It has an emotional aspect, as well as an institutional aspect. So I tried to capture, through my images, the interpersonal relationship with my mother.

When did you decide to become a photographer and why?

My photographic journey started in 2000 through a project called “Empowering Sex Workers’ Children through Photography”, supported by UNICEF; precisely, when the facilitator visited our area and handed me a small compact analogue camera, asking me to photograph my mother and the surroundings revolving around her. He started teaching us how to compose a picture and so forth.

Do you work in your home country India most of the time?

Yes I work in India only – but, if I should get opportunity to work abroad, I would love to do so.

The perfect situation to take the perfect photo…

Creating the perfect situation out of the imperfect is all that matters :)

Which of your own pictures is closest to being that perfect photo? Why?

There are two pictures actually: a self portrait with my mother, which reminds me of how far I have been from her throughout my childhood, and the other one is with some kids, which brings me back to the days of my own childhood.

On your website, you tell your visitors that you are “a dreamer by profession, a cook by passion”, and that traveling is your mission. Can you elaborate on this?

I love the idea that being a dreamer makes the world a better place! My dreams keep me motivated to do something new everyday, while cooking helps me to be happy and make others happy with my food. Traveling on the other hand is something I take as my education – because it teaches me something new about life every day, and helps me to understand the world outside my comfort zone.

You can buy Sankar’s pictures from his gallery on photocircle.net. For more impressions, make sure to also visit his blog on Instagram.