Photo: Steve McCurry
Photographer Steve McCurry has been dazzling viewers with his iconic photographs for over 30 years, producing some of the most recognizable images of the 20th century. Now until April 4 New Yorkers can catch a glimpse of McCurry’s work at the Rubin Museum of Art.
McCurry is best known for his image, “Afghan Girl,” which appeared on the June 1985 issue of National Geographic, and for his extensive use of Kodak’s Kodachrome film. He has spent most of his career covering armed conflicts around the world and bringing breathtaking images back with him.
The photographs featured in Steve McCurry: India were taken over decades of visits. He first traveled to India as a freelance photographer. According to his National Geographic biography page, his trip to India taught him how to watch and wait: “If you wait,” he said, “people will forget your camera and the soul will drift up into view.”
McCurry’s infamous “Afghan Girl” cover from June 1985. Photo: complex.com
In his usual fashion, McCurry captures the Indian people and landscape through a stunning use of color, leading lines, and symmetry. His image of a man standing in a pool colored with the reflection of the Taj Mahal shows India’s great monuments as not merely sterile fixtures, but as artistic backdrops that are present in even the most mundane moments of everyday life.
His work not only encapsulates the visual culture of the country and its people, but it also provides a visual element to the religious aspects of Indian life. One image shows a man carrying a decorated statue of Ganesh–the Hindu god that is believed to remove obstacles–into a blue-gray silky ocean, while another shows a man covered in green pigment being held up by a group of men chalked in red from the Holi Festival in Rajasthan.
Photo: Steve McCurry
To see India through Steve McCurry’s eyes is to step into the lives of its inhabitants and to not only recognize them as living beings, but to see them as integral strokes of color in the unique aesthetic element that Indian culture so beautifully holds.
For more photographs from the series, visit Steve McCurry’s official website and check out his photo book, India.
Agra, Uttar Pradesh, India. Photo: Steve McCurry