|
Archival Notes
THE LAST PHOTOGRAPHS OF SRI AUROBINDO
During his youth and early manhood Sri Aurobindo was photographed around a dozen times. As many pictures were taken during the four years (1906-10) that he was a public figure. After his withdrawal to Pondicherry he was photographed more rarely; still about ten portraits from the 1910-26 period exist. Several of them show him posing before artificial backdrops of the kind used in studios in those days. The last of these pictures seem to have been taken during the early or middle 1920s. In 1926 Sri Aurobindo retired and no photographs of him were taken for a quarter-century. When there was a suggestion in 1940 that he allow himself to be photographed he simply refused, commenting: "Plenty of people have proposed that before." Copies of the photographs taken during the twenties were sold to devotees, some of whom commented that the Sri Aurobindo they saw at darshan looked "quite different" from his pictures.1
This dearth of photographs ended in April 1950 when the French photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson was permitted to take a series of portraits of Sri Aurobindo in his room. Seven months later, on 5 December 1950, Sri Aurobindo passed away. The Cartier-Bresson photographs thus became the last pictures of him to be taken during his lifetime. Immediately after Sri Aurobindo's passing four photographers of the Ashram took photographs of his body. Like Cartier-Bresson's, these pictures capture some of the majesty and beauty of his later years. In this issue of Archives and Research we examine the circumstances in which these two series of photographs were taken. In Documents in the Life of Sri Aurobindo we reproduce a number of written and oral documents dealing with the photographs and photographers and incidentally providing glimpses of the life of the Ashram in those days. Among the documents is an interview that Cartier-Bresson gave our representative in Paris on 25 April 1990, coincidentally forty years to the day after he took his photographs. Oral documents are more likely than written records to contain
Page-228 inaccuracies and inconsistencies. In Archival Notes we will attempt to piece together a coherent and consistent account of the two events.
The Cartier-Bresson Photographs
When Henri Cartier-Bresson came to Pondicherry in 1950 he was already known as one of the world's leading photographers. Since then his reputation has grown considerably; historians of photography now agree in ranking him among the most significant practitioners of this young art. Born in Cantaloupe, near Paris, in 1908, Cartier-Bresson's first artistic interest was painting, which he studied for three years in Paris and Cambridge before taking up photography in 1930. The next year he began his career as a touring photographer with a journey to Africa. This turned out rather badly: his film got spoiled by the damp and he contracted a bad case of black-water fever. After further touring in Europe Cartier-Bresson discovered the Leica, a German 35 mm camera renowned for its precision optics, small size and quiet mechanism. The Leica permitted him to develop two traits that became the hallmarks of his style: "invisibility" and spontaneity. These have been explained by critic Michael Langford in the following words: "Henri Cartier-Bresson never attempts to influence what happens in front of his camera. This attitude is coupled with an ability to react rapidly to 'key' moments."2 Cartier-Bresson himself explained his artistic aspiration as a craving "to seize the whole essence, in the confines of one single photograph, of some situation that was unrolling before my eyes."3 An important influence on his approach was the Zen idea of spontaneity in action, which he encountered in Eugen Herrigel's Zen in the Art of Archery. Moved by Buddhism, Cartier-Bresson was also familiar with the Indian spiritual tradition. Before coming to Pondicherry he had read some of Sri Aurobindo's works in French translation.
During the 1930s Cartier-Bresson developed his distinctive style while travelling in Europe and North America. In 1936 he returned to France and worked with film director Jean Renoir. Cartier-Bresson has always considered painting, photography and film to be "the gear shift of an automobile"4 (cf. his remark in Document 10). Captured by the Germans at the beginning of World War II, he escaped and worked with the French resistance. After the War he went to New York, where his works were exhibited at The Museum of Modern Art. In 1947 he, Robert Capa, Werner Biscoe of, David Seymour, Ernst Haas and George Rodger founded Magnum Photos. This cooperative agency enabled them to retain possession of their negatives and to exert some control over how their work was published. Magnum pioneered the "picture story" published by magazines such as Life and Paris Match. Its photographers, particularly Cartier-Bresson himself, raised photojournalism to the level of an art.
Some months after the founding of Magnum, Cartier-Bresson came to the East. His photographs of Gandhi's funeral in January 1948 won him an Overseas Press Club Award. Afterwards he toured widely in different countries of Asia and North Africa. In 1950 he was again in India and on 13 April he wrote to Sri Aurobindo Ashram from Madras. His letter was addressed to the Ashram's Secretary General, Philippe Barbier Saint-Hilaire, known as Pavitra. Introducing himself as a professional photographer associated with Magnum Photos, Cartier-Bresson asked for permission to attend the darshan of 24 April and to make a
Page-229 photographic reportage on the Ashram's life (Document 1). The next day, 14 April, Cartier-Bresson was in Tiruvannamalai to see and photograph Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi. That very day at 8.47 in the evening Sri Raman a attained Mahasamadhi. Cartier-Bresson was on hand to photograph his funeral. Returning to Madras he found a reply to his letter to the Ashram granting him permission to attend the darshan of the 24th and approving his request to make a photographic reportage on the Ashram's life (Document 2).
Cartier-Bresson arrived in Pondicherry on 23 April. According to his own account he was introduced to the Mother by Francois Baron, the Commissaries (formerly Gouverneur) of Pondicherry, which was still a French possession. The Mother received him well and confirmed her permission for him to take pictures of Ashram activities. She insisted however that he should not include her in any shot. Armed with the Mother's consent Cartier-Bresson moved around the Ashram quite freely. Sometimes he was accompanied by Ashramites like Jayantilal Parekh, an artist, and Robi Ganguli, a photographer, but generally he worked alone. During the afternoon of the 23rd Cartier-Bresson took pictures of disciples passing in front of the Mother, of the Ashram's cottage industries, and of Golconde, the Ashram residential quarters whose architecture he greatly admired. At some point during the day he had a roll of negatives developed in order to check whether he was exposing his film correctly in Pondicherry's contrasty light.In the evening he asked the Mother and Pavitra for permission to photograph her. It appears that in the interval the Mother had seen one of Cartier-Bresson's books, which impressed her favourably. This induced her to grant him permission to include her in some of his shots. Cartier-Bresson photographed the Mother giving nuts to the children, distributing flowers, etc. Eventually she allowed him to take some fairly close-up shots of her, but she never sat for anything like a formal portrait.
The next day, April 24th, was the day of the darshan. In the morning Cartier-Bresson photographed the Mother's daily "balcony darshan" and later the queues of devotees waiting to go to the first floor room where she and Sri Aurobindo sat during the darshan ceremony. Cartier-Bresson had asked for permission to photograph the two of them giving darshan and, apparently at the last minute, he was allowed to do so. Rushing upstairs he took ten shots, only one of which turned out well (Document 13). In those days the "fast" or sensitive films that photographers now use in low-light conditions were not available. "Slow" films such as he was using demand relatively long exposure times. A slight movement during the exposure results in an un sharp image. Without lights to increase the illumination and with only a monopod (a stand with one leg) to steady the camera, it was almost inevitable that these shots would be affected by camera-shake.
The next morning Cartier-Bresson went to the Mother and asked for permission to photograph Sri Aurobindo. His argument, he told our interviewer earlier
* Cartier-Bresson may have shown the contact prints of this roll to the Mother. In April 1990 he said that he went over all this contact prints with her and that she crossed out some of the shots (Document 10). Certainly he did not show her the vast majority of his contact prints since the film was not developed until he got to Bombay. The contact-prints kepi in Magnum's archives show no sign of frames having been crossed out. But one of the early sheets of contact prints is missing. This may be the one that was made from the film developed in Pondicherry. It is al least possible that the photographer went over this sheet with the Mother.
Page-230 this year, was: "I am only photographing the female aspect of the Divine. What about the male aspect?" This seems to have convinced the Mother. After consulting with Sri Aurobindo she informed Cartier-Bresson that he could photograph him, but only in very subdued light. She wanted the photographs to have a mood of "artistic shadow". Cartier-Bresson already had told the Mother that the darshan photographs would probably turn out badly because there had not been enough light; but there was no getting her to change her mind. When he went into Sri Aurobindo's room he took photographs, he later exaggerated, "in practically pitch dark" (Document 10). This time however he had a tripod to help him steady the camera, and most of the seventeen shots that he took of Sri Aurobindo turned out well. There is a legend in the Ashram that Cartier-Bresson was so nervous as he stood before Sri Aurobindo that his hands shook and therefore his photographs were not as sharp as they might have been. Since he used a tripod it is evident that this story is not true. He does however seem to have been affected by his ten-minute darshan of Sri Aurobindo. According to Robi Ganguli, who was waiting for him outside, when Cartier-Bresson "came out he was just perspiring" and quite nervous. Robi and his companion asked him eagerly, "How did it go?" The photographer replied. "I have never seen a man like this. He was there absolutely immobile." Robi felt "there was a sort of tremendous elation in him" for having been able to take these photographs (Document 13).
Cartier-Bresson spent the rest of the 25th taking pictures of Ashram activities: Anu Purani's dancing, the dining hall, the Mother's distribution ceremonies. He also took some shots of the streets of Pondicherry, which in those days were quite deserted in the afternoon. In the evening he captured the Mother during her daily game of tennis, and also took pictures of some prominent disciples: Pavitra, Nolini Kant a Gupta, Pranab Kumar Bhattacharya. Among the last shots he took in the Ashram were of the Mother's evening class in the playground.
The next morning Cartier-Bresson left Pondicherry by train. Before his departure he came to an informal agreement with the Mother and Pavitra "that he would submit all pictures for approval before publication" (Document 4). Two months passed however and no prints arrived. On 13 July Pavitra wrote the photographer a polite reminder and a month and a half later Magnum Photos sent prints to Pavitra as agreed (Documents 6 & 7). The Mother and Pavitra found the prints "all very good" and assured Cartier-Bresson that he "could use them freely for publication" (Document 8a).
Having obtained permission to publish. Magnum Photos prepared prints, captions and textual material (Document 4) based on Cartier-Bresson's notes (Document 2) and sent them to various illustrated magazines in Europe and America. The first to publish the photographs was Heute ("Today"), a German weekly brought out from Munich. The issue of 8 November 1950 carried a two-page spread of pictures together with a brief write-up. The photos also were purchased by Illustrated, a British magazine, which published them on 6 January 1951, and The Illustrated Weekly of India, which published them on 17 June 1951.
On 5 December 1950 Sri Aurobindo attained Mahasamadhi. Informing Magnum Photos of this fact the next day, Pavitra asked for a complete review of the agreement regarding the publication of the photographs. He told the agency that the Mother did not want any of the pictures taken of Sri Aurobindo in his room
Page-231 to be published. Those of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother together could be published but the negatives of these shots as well as the negatives of the shots of Sri Aurobindo alone should be sent to the Ashram. Money was no object (Document 8a). Magnum replied by wire two days later informing Pavitra that arrangements for distribution had already been made (Document 8d). Two weeks later Cartier-Bresson wrote to the Ashram conveying his regrets on Sri Aurobindo's passing (Document 8e). But so far as can be determined from available documents, neither Magnum nor Cartier-Bresson said anything in regard to the sale of the negatives. This is not really surprising. For an agency like Magnum the question of selling negatives simply did not arise. It had been established precisely with the idea of allowing the associated photographers to keep possession of their negatives. This was not merely a matter of business. Cartier-Bresson considered his negatives to be "part of his eye" (Document 8g) and had never sold any of them.
Early in January the copies of the issues of Heute and Illustrated featuring Sri Aurobindo's photographs were sent to the Ashram. The Mother, Pavitra and everyone else who saw them were distressed, not by the photographs themselves but by the accompanying texts. The write-up in the German magazine was, as Pavitra said, "not brilliant but passable". Taking the respectful if not always accurate text provided by Magnum, Heute's editors gave everything a sarcastic slant. For example they took Magnum's statement "Sri Aurobindo is known throughout India as the Living God" (Document 4) and by placing the phrase within inverted commas (Der. "Lebende Gott") gave it a twist that Magnum did not intend. The captions and text in Illustrated were even more tasteless. The text, written by a certain Charles Humblest, was fair when it dealt with Sri Aurobindo's early life and the Ashram's activities. But whenever Humblest touched on Sri Aurobindo's yogic experiences and power he used language calculated to inspire ridicule.*
The Illustrated article made it all the more clear to the Mother and Pavitra that it was necessary for them to obtain the negatives of Cartier-Bresson's photographs of Sri Aurobindo. In a letter to Cartier-Bresson dated 13 January, Pavitra used very strong language to convey the Mother's displeasure with the article in the English magazine and her disappointment with Cartier-Bresson himself (Document 8f). A communication also was sent to Andr6 Morisset, the Mother's son, who called on the photographer in Paris and explained the situation to him (Document 10). Cartier-Bresson replied to Pavitra on 24 January expressing acute distress that the Mother had reacted so strongly against a piece of writing over which he had no control. He explained that his photographs all bore a stamp requiring the editors of the journal to use the accompanying caption or one similar to it in spirit. But it was impossible for him to see that his instructions were carried out in every case (Document 8g).
In regard to the Mother's request for the negatives, Cartier-Bresson explained to Pavitra that while he had never before sold his negatives he was willing to make an exception in this case. In coming to this decision he acted in part on the advice
* The Illustrated Weekly of India published the same photographs as Illustrated. The accompanying caption? and text, based the same material that Magnum had supplied to Illustrated and Heute. were dignified and respectful.
Page-232 of Robert Capa, a Magnum founder (and famous war photographer) who looked after the agency's financial dealings. Capa told him, "You do not want to be in trouble with the Mother and Magnum is on the verge of bankruptcy. To stop further publication of the photos, we will sell the negatives to the Mother." (Document 10) Cartier-Bresson explained to Pavitra that he had nothing to do with the agency's financial dealings. He would however ask Magnum to "study the question and make you a proposal which I hope will be satisfactory to you." Pavitra replied on 24 February expressing pleasure that Cartier-Bresson had shown himself to be the gentlemen he and the Mother remembered and complimenting him on his photographic vision, which both he and the Mother appreciated (Document 8h).
The negotiations between the Ashram and Magnum Photos were undertaken on the Ashram's side by V. S. Tatachari, generally known as "Mr Tata", a disciple living in New York who had founded the Sri Aurobindo Library, a publishing concern. Various letters and telegrams related to the agreement are published as Documents 8i to 8n. Magnum asked for $3000. Tata was prepared to bargain but the Mother forbade him and the amount was paid in full. The necessary dollars were purchased in Pondicherry at the rate of about Rs 6.50 to the dollar making the total in rupees something like Rs 19,500. (The official rate at that time was closer to Rs 5 to the dollar, but it was more convenient to purchase the currency on the open market in Pondicherry, which was at that time a free port within French India.)5 Payment was made early in June and towards the end of that month the negatives were received at the Ashram.
Because the facts concerning Cartier-Bresson's dealings with the Ashram have hitherto not been made public, certain misconceptions have entered circulation. It is thought by some that the photographer agreed to give his negatives to the Ashram before leaving Pondicherry or to send them afterwards. This certainly was not part of the original agreement. Another allegation is that Cartier-Bresson failed to live up to his agreement to send prints of his photographs to the Ashram before selling them. In fact Magnum sent the prints four months after Cartier-Bresson's departure from Pondicherry. (The delay was due in part to the fact that he stayed in India for some time before returning to France.) Magnum abided by its agreement not to sell the photographs to anyone before the Mother had seen them. On her part the Mother abided scrupulously by her agreement not to show the photographs to anyone before their publication. In fact she did not mention their existence to more than one or two individuals. As a result those in the Ashram who were looking forward to seeing the photographs assumed that Car-tier-Bresson had not kept his word. Another charge against Cartier-Bresson is that he published his work without the Mother's permission. In fact he received explicit permission to publish by Pavitra's letter of 7 September 1950 (Document 8a). The final allegation against Cartier-Bresson is that he extorted an excessive amount of money in exchange for his negatives. To be sure Rs 19,500 was a substantial amount in 1950, the equivalent of at least a lakh today. It is possible that Magnum asked as much as they did because Cartier-Bresson had a rather exaggerated notion of the Ashram's assets (see Document 10). In addition Magnum was near bankruptcy at the time. But it should not be forgotten that Magnum was a commercial organization. It had invested a significant amount of money in the story by preparing prints and text and distributing the material. The "consideration"
Page-233 it asked was high, but may well have represented what it would have received if the photographs had been sold to all the prospective customers. The Mother in any event does not seem to have been bothered by the amount and she specifically forbade her agent in New York from bargaining. By selling special photographic albums (which were planned even before Sri Aurobindo's passing — see Document 7) she was quickly able to recover the cost of the negatives. Sales since then have made the transaction far from a losing one even from the financial point of view. But the real gain has been in having the photographs themselves. Without them there would be no record of how Sri Aurobindo looked during the last years of his life. In addition some of the lesser-known photographs provide a glimpse of the life in the Ashram forty years ago, showing in particular some of the Mother's daily activities.
The Mahasamadhi Photographs
Sri Aurobindo passed away at 1.26 on the morning of 5 December 1950. His health had been a matter of concern for some time, particularly since the middle of November. But no one in the Ashram expected that his illness would prove fatal. Moments after his passing the Mother was summoned to Sri Aurobindo's bedside. She "stood near his feet with an intense penetrating gaze, an incarnation of divine strength, poise and calm."6 One of the first things she did after leaving the room was to inform Pranab Kumar Bhattacharya, the young director of the Ashram's Department of Physical Education, who slept nearby. Entering Sri Aurobindo's room with the Mother, Pranab saw the Master's body lying on his bed. The Mother asked him whether he wanted to take photographs. He declined. The Mother then asked him to tell the other photographers of the Ashram to come with their equipment. Leaving the ashram at around 2.30 Pranab went to the houses of Vidyavrata Arya, Venkatesh Sherrod and Chimanbhai Patel. He informed each of them that Sri Aurobindo had passed away and that the Mother wanted them to photograph his body (Document 16). All of them were stunned by the news, but put aside their emotions and got ready to perform the task the Mother had asked of them. Before coming to the Ashram Chimanbhai went to fetch Robi Ganguli, with whom he used to work. Besides their cameras, Chimanbhai and Robi brought along a set of flood lamps without which it would have been impossible to take photographs at that hour. Venkatesh was the first photographer to arrive, followed by Vidyavrata and Chimanbhai and Robi. Once the lights had been set up, they went about their work individually. Dr Sanyal, one of Sri Aurobindo's physicians and himself a photographer, gave them some suggestions.
The photographers continued to work for half an hour or longer. By the time they finished the rest of the Ashramites had been informed of Sri Aurobindo's passing and had rushed to the Ashram. Venkatesh, the last of the photographers to leave, saw hundreds of them waiting to enter the room as he went downstairs. The photographers developed their film separately in their darkrooms. Vidyavrata, feeling that "something was missing", went again to Sri Aurobindo's room to shoot a roll of film in daylight. During the morning of the 5th all the photographers went separately to the Mother to show her their results. The Mother selected some of Vidyavrata's photographs, one of which (Plate 9) seemed to her to have "the Power". When Venkatesh showed her the first set of prints he had made, she said
Page-234 that they were not up to the mark. But she was delighted with one of the prints in the second set he developed. This she called "Beatitude" and reserved for use in the Bulletin of Physical Education (Plate 10). A day or two later, on the Mother's orders, the photographers made five thousand copies of Vidyavrata's photograph. Chimanbhai and Robi did most of the printing and toning work, helped by the others (Document 19). On December 10th, the day after Sri Aurobindo's body was placed in the Samadhi (an event that the photographers documented), the Mother distributed these prints to Ashramites and visitors . P. H.
NOTES
1. Talks of 17 February and 11 January 1940. Cf. Nirodbaran, Talks with Sri Aurobindo, vols. 2 & 3. Madras: Sri Aurobindo Society, 1985, p. 104. 2. Michael Langford, The Complete Encyclopedia of Photography, London: Ebury Press, 1982, p. 353. 3. q. Beaumont and Nancy Newhall, Masters of Photography. New York: Park Lane, 1981, p. 160. 4. Ibid. 5. Information from Jayantilal Parekh, September 1990. 6. Nirodbaran, Twelve Years with Sri Aurobindo. Pondicherry: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1972, p. 270.
Page-235
Edited and published by Harikant Patel for the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, Publication Department. Printed by Amiyo Ranjan Ganguli at the Sri Aurobindo Ashram Press, Pondicherry 605002.
|