It was the year 2019, when I first encountered the luminous work of French-Sri Lankan photographer, Vasantha Yogananthan. In a gallery overlooking the Gateway of India in Bombay, the concrete walls were lifted by imagery drenched in pastel hues and mellow light recounting the Ramayan. Under a project titled, A Myth of Two Souls (2013-2021), Yogananthan created seven chapters (Early Times, The Promise, Exile, Dandaka, Howling Winds, Afterlife, and Amma) in the form of photobooks that reimagined a tale that has been retold numerous times, in a myriad of forms.

The obsession with this epic stemmed from the artist’s childhood in Grenoble, France, where he passionately read the Amar Chitra Katha version of the Ramayan belonging to his Sri Lankan-born father. Yogananthan was also privy to his father’s extensive library as he grew-up, and was increasingly drawn to the Indian miniature paintings, and old imagery present in ancient books on Yoga. Interestingly, while my association with the Ramayan has forcefully turned political in a highly polarised Indian landscape, there is an image from the project titled ‘The Crossing,’ made in Madhubani, Bihar in 2014, that has gently nestled itself into my subconscious since the first time I saw it. The presence of pink and purple surrealistic sceneries instantly teleports me to Yogananthan’s airy imagery, that so seamlessly blurs the lines between fact and fiction.

On a video call with the artist who has shifted base from Paris to Marseille post-pandemic, we talk about this binary facet of art to bind as well as distance a person from associations, memories, situations, and imaginations. Yogananthan cites an anecdote by philosopher and spiritual figure J.Krishnamurti who says “Look at the tree in front of you. Are you looking at the tree or is thought looking at it? Can you look at somebody without the image that you have about that someone? When you look at a tree, your mind is already active: ‘It's an oak tree; I like it; it's old, it's young,’ and so on - so you are not looking at all. You can look at a fact only when the mind is completely quiet, undisturbed by thought and images.” The artist believes that it is the same aspect of preconceived notions/ideas/and thoughts that we bring into this act of photography as well. “This very idea of distance between the photographer and the subject is one of the most important questions I ask myself when I make my images. How can the medium be a tool to bridge the space between you and your surroundings, and make you connect to the world in a way that feels meaningful to you?” he ruminates.

It is possibly why the photographer doesn’t over enthusiastically display the artist statements in the beginning of his multifarious bodies of work on his website. To get to the words, we have to first traverse through the imagery, stringing them together with our own interpretations of the universe Yogananthan builds. With short, poetic, and rhythmic titles such as Mystery Street, Embrace, Interludes, Sounds of Silence, and Fleuve Flauve, we are invited into lucid visions that the artist paints. When I question if both, the titles, as well as the lack of exposition is deliberate, the artist nods in agreement. He says that even though he is a voracious reader, when you add words and pictures together, the first thing that happens is that they tend to explain one another. “Of course, they have much to gain from one another as well, but I think the trick is put a lot of thought into it so that they don't cancel each other out,” explains Yogananthan. As for the titles, he likes to leave hints for the viewer- directing them to a place, but not quite forcing them there.

To elaborate, his work Mystery Street (2022) is set amidst a blistering summer in Louisiana, but the geography of the place is probably the last thing one would notice while engaging with the images. In the series, we are offered a glimpse into the world of children who are playing, wondering, thinking, and going about their everyday life amidst an imaginary portal of sorts. The work is an intersection between documentary styles of shooting with fable-like ambiguity, which invites the viewer to form their own narrative.

If I could hold one of the photographer’s images in the palm of my hand, I’m almost certain they would feel weightless. They carry a lightness to them that is distinctive throughout his various genres of work- be it personal, or commercial. Whether its intricately textured images of Ice Stupas in Ladakh made for The New Yorker in 2019, or in Piémanson- about the last wild beach in France that was closed in 2015, or even in The Promise, the second chapter in A Myth of Two Souls that celebrates the love between Rama and Sita; Yogananthan’s photographs float. He says that as an artist, he relies on light and colour to allow the readers to engage with his pictures in a specific way. For example, in a piece about the artist in 2019, I remember writing about how he photographed A Myth of Two Souls through various seasons- summer, monsoon, and winter. This was apparent in his imagery, where the viewer could almost feel the mist settling in one’s eyes, or the sudden gust of wind on a scorching hot day. Similarly, by shooting certain images at noon, there was an increase in luminosity in them, which made them look like they were disconnected from reality.

I ponder upon whether this feeling comes from a slow engagement with the medium, and if the artist’s long-term tryst with the photobook (including being the co-founder of a publishing house named Chose Commune) has had an impact on his process of creating. He mentions that it has because now, while he produces pictures, he is simultaneously also editing, and sequencing a potential book. Of course, the project starts with a lose intention, and then wanders, and transforms as the photographs begin to sit next to one another.

Over time, Yogananthan has seen a definite shift in his relationship with the medium. Earlier, it was about shooting while on a continuous quest for a ‘good image.’ But as his practice grows and evolves, he realises that time, space, distance, struggle, interactions, and conversations are all parts of a ‘very good image,’ something that one will value even 20-30 years down the line. He believes that patience is key to experiencing the world, and then pouring it into one’s work when the moment presents itself. He eloquently says, “You use the word lightness, but I also believe that an image should have equal parts weight and density to it. You might have to face multiple days of average photographs to finally get to the day when you are happy with an image, and I think that’s great. After all, if everything was easy most of the time, it would not be as exciting anyway.”