Jama Masjid Lane

Completed 2020

It was in the evening, the first time I found it and it found me. I had to split my attention between my phone, trying to decode what the map was showing, and that mysteirous area I was passing by, but I clearly remember being amazed by the multitude of things happening in a street which was two to three meters wide: butchers cutting meat outdoors, shoe-makers and welders, hydraulic machines cutting thick iron rods, colorful vegetable stalls’s vendors chanting to attract buyers, goats eating cabbage, dogs eating cabagge, children eating cabbage, scotters elegantly driving through the stalls and people, chai being served, a small crowd waiting for the next batch of chicken tika.
For the next three months, on my way to and back from work, I walked through that same street everyday. Every journey, was a whole new discovery, and the atmosphere of the streetscape would  change from morning to evening - as if sceneries would drop to announce acts.
As I later found out, Jama Masjid Lane is not an exception amongst the intricate street-system in Indian cities, specially in urban contexts like Mumbai and Delhi. Jama Masjid Lane: visual essay was intended to become a more in-depth study on the street and its self-configuration processes. Go Slow and Held Hands are two films part of the initial research.

Bombai, India
+ Video