You might know filmmaker and photographer Sunhil Sippy through his films such as "Noor" and "Snip." But his book of photographs “The Opium of Time-Photographs of Mumbai 2010-2020” romances the rain of Maximum City with focussed perfection. The proficient photographer spoke to OT on the occasion of World Photography Day about his process and what it means to be a street photographer. Here are some excerpts from the interview.
What is your most memorable monsoon memory of Mumbai?
Memorable is a tricky word because I think probably the most powerful memory I have is of the 2005 floods. I think it was 2005 when I was very safe and protected, but it was terrifying. We always talk about monsoon with an air of romance—a general sense of merriment. But we also have to remember that it is dangerous.
It's intriguing how the common man actually relates to the monsoon. You see hordes of people walking around train tracks, where trees have been stranded, you see people who can't get home. Despite that, there's a kind of camaraderie and people come together at this time, which is what I think was memorable and beautiful.
Tell us a little about your process as a photographer in pursuit of the rain.
In terms of my work as a photographer, 2015 was my most intense time capturing the monsoon. I would shoot in heavy downpours. And in those days, my camera was definitely not waterproof; I had to send it to Germany to be fixed a couple of times. And what's strange is that in monsoon imagery, you can never see the rain in the photographs. It's very hard to tell. So capturing them can sometimes be extremely overwhelming, but the result looks very easy.
What is your favourite photograph that you've captured?
Personally, my favourite image is the silhouette of the umbrellas. The image is sort of blurry. But I think that sometimes you need one image to tell everything about it all, and it's that one image for me. I have always photographed for myself, so any photo I take has to make sense to me first and foremost. During 2015, I was very much integrated onto the street. Instagram didn't really exist then, so there was no real objective. It wasn't like how it is now. You didn't take pictures just to post incessantly. The moment a ring of a cloud comes, your feed will be filled with what's happening, and that is very antithetical to my photographic practice. When I photograph, I let some of my pictures sit—sometimes for years—before I see whether they have value.
Is there a story behind that picture that you would like to share?
This was an image that I probably shot in 2015. And I didn't even look at the file till maybe 2017. I just thought it was a bad, blurry picture. Three years later, when I actually went back and looked at it, I pulled it out. And I thought if there could that be something poetic there?
It was quite dark, so I had to pull it up a bit just to see what was in that picture. And then I saw there's a mobile phone, there's an umbrella, there's a guy in a dance pose, there's all these things happening in it, and there's water coming over the edge of the wall. There are all kinds of things happening in that image, and yet, it's not literal; it's not solid.
What makes you decide on a particular subject when you're out walking the streets in search of an image?
It doesn't work that way. That's the beauty of street photography. It's the uncertainty and the unpredictability. In my daily life, as a filmmaker, everything has to be predetermined, especially in advertising. There's a wonderful Magnum photographer called David, who said, "Your camera really is irrelevant. It's your shoes that matter." So, for me, it's about walking. You walk and you walk, and sometimes you stand. And then you wait, and sometimes you sit. And things happen. And often, you can spend the day where you're out for four, five, or six hours, and nothing happens. And then suddenly, in 10 minutes, something crazy occurs; something beautiful happens. It's very spiritual. That's why I always call street photography a form of meditation. It's where you're shutting out all the noise of the world. You can be in a crowd of 10,000 people, but it's still silent because the level of focus in your mind is what allows things to come into your world.
So there isn't a particular thing you look for?
No, but there might be places. For example, a lot of my pictures are on Marine Drive. I have some pictures from Byculla, where there's flooding, but the pictures are not particularly pretty. I hope my pictures evoke a sense of romance. I would never call myself a documentary photographer. I think I like seeing a prettier version or a more emotional connection that my photographs exude.
Since street photography is all about walking for you, what is the longest that you've gone on to walk in a day at a stretch?
I used to be an early riser during my initial days as a photographer. So I used to often get up early in the morning because I wanted to see how the city worked at that time. I wanted to see how the interactions in the city happened and how everything worked. I don't know if you know, but I had an injury. I got into street photography because I lost the heel of my left foot in an accident. And that was actually what motivated me to walk, ironically enough. I had to exercise that limb, so it became something that helped. But yeah, I would not typically do more than three or four hours of walking at a stretch.
What are your favourite places in Mumbai that you usually go to?
The thing about Mumbai that fascinates me is the entire eastern seaboard. If you imagine that Lower Parel was once, in a sense, part of that circuit along with all the textile mills. The further east you go, you have the salt pounds, sprawling ghetto-like spaces. It is a very unusual cityscape that nobody talks about that much. But it's industrial; it's evolving. So amidst all this industrial kind of history, you've got New Cuffe Parade, or you've got some new enclave. All of this new infrastructure is changing the face of the city fast, and it makes me wonder what everything will look like in 10 years.