When American photojournalist Mary Ellen Mark (1940-2015) froze frames on the sex workers and their patrons at Mumbai바카라s Falkland Road in 1978, it marked the fulfilment of a wish she had harboured for a decade: to somehow 바카라penetrate the superficial view바카라 of Falkland Road, a lane in Kamathipura. She had first arrived in the city in 1968 on an assignment as the leading photographer with Magnum, an international agency, and was deeply struck by the images of 바카라cage-girls바카라 peeping out of the windows of their grimy hovels. The curiosity of a firang woman about the prostitutes was met with hostility and suspicion from Madams, as the pimps or brothel keepers are colloquially called. For ten years, these images haunted Mary Ellen till she revisited these bylanes. She spent several months here, getting herself immersed in the rhythm of life in the red-light area. In the intervening years, she had come to India eleven times, trying all the while to earn the trust of her subject.
In her quest to gain a fuller understanding of the prostitutes, Mary Ellen resisted journalistic froideur in order to see the street women as 바카라genuine human beings with real feelings and real dignity바카라. Her series on Kamathipura resulted in the photobook, 바카라Falkland Road: Prostitutes Of Bombay바카라 (Alfred A. Knopf, 1981). Each frame in the book is imbued with palpable empathy; her gaze takes the women in the flesh trade beyond the indignities of their work, and humanizes them. Putla, a thirteen-year-old prostitute who was sold to the brothel by her mother, features on the book cover, wearing nothing except a silver necklace and a few bangles on her wrist 바카라 her sad, kohled eyes tell the story of a life in hell. Mary Ellen바카라s frames, even of intertwined bodies, do not betray any voyeuristic intent; instead they give us a sense of the darkness that lies beneath the garishness of a world where selling bodies is a survival strategy. 바카라Through Mary Ellen바카라s lens, street prostitution and dim brothels popped in vibrant hues of blue and green. The dingy rooms and drawn curtains gave a sense of place. The expressions on the women in them 바카라 somber, helpless and debilitated 바카라 brought that place to life,바카라 wrote Andrew Boryga in 바카라NPR바카라 after Mark바카라s death in May 2015.
Though Mary Ellen wrote 20 books, including two other titles on India (바카라Photographs of Mother Teresa바카라s Missions of Charity in Calcutta바카라 and 바카라Indian Circus바카라), 바카라Falkland Road바카라 remained a significant work in her canon. It contains 65 photographs made over the period of six weeks. The blurbs describe these images as 바카라beautiful, electric, shocking and remarkable for their emotional power and for the visceral brilliance of their colour.바카라 Publisher Knopf saw the book as 바카라an astonishing work of insight into a raw and frightening world, made accessible by the completeness of the photographer바카라s involvement, by her humanity, and by the way she captures the variety of individual life and the colour, passion, and tenderness that still abide there.바카라
Mary Ellen바카라s photographs and photo essays were published in 바카라The New Yorker,바카라 바카라Life바카라, 바카라New York Times Magazine바카라, 바카라Rolling Stone바카라, 바카라Vanity Fair,바카라 and several other publications. The pictures she made during her travels spanning over four decades reveal her humanist vision. At a time when prostitution was considered to be a taboo and most Indian photographers looked at it from a distance, Mark was among the first to tenderly evoke the inner lives of prostitutes. 바카라My book is a metaphor for prostitutes not only in Falkland Road but for prostitutes all over the world,바카라 Mark said in a 2014 interview. Her iconic shots are testimony not just to her photographic prowess but also to her humanity and compassion. They embody her lifelong mission to document the lives of the dispossessed and the damned.
