samurai and the indian hamlet – a day in culture

04.02.2026

I was writing to A. It was always a letter to A. A. was the best of my friends. I was telling them what The Tiger had done today.

It began in the morning with shaving after a week. Then, after a hearty and healthy breakfast, I rushed down to the British Museum for the Samurai exhibition. The space was spectacular. The weaponry, the costumes, the video along a massive wall. The mission was to show that the warrior culture is also an artistic and cultural endeavour. There were splendid Japanese woodblocks and even video games concerning the heroic exploits of the warriors and the ruling class.

This decadent culture looks to the time of the Samurai as an inspiration. A society with honour and with bravery that makes the corruption of the present pale into the insignificance that it is. And where do the Samurai come from? It is not Japan. They come from India and Buddhism. The Samurai are the brothers of India.

I rushed through the Hawaii exhibition afterwards. It was marred by a concentration on the relationships between that country and Great Britain. However, there were some glorious costumes on display, feather necklaces and feather cloaks radiant with the beauty of colour. The grimacing statuettes were splendid in their own way, truly characterful representations of humanoid figures.

The Oxfam bookshop next to the British Museum followed. I am saving a visit there tomorrow at lunchtime to pick up what I spotted if it is still there – fate will decide.

The Outernet was the next distraction before I wolfed down a reduced price M & S gala pork pie for lunch in about ten minutes. I watched a number of videos:

Biophilia by Sebastien Labrunie – about the Mother Tree.

Superradiance by Memo Akten and Katie Hofstadter – About embodiment in the planet

Pools by Maggie West and Scott Pagano – about water absorbing into sand in brilliant colours

Cacophony of Stillness by Jesse Woolston – the expression of natural phenomena in new and challenging ways

Transcendence by Robert Newman – geometry and the depths of the natural world

I played on the Roland piano. There were some really accomplished pianists that played before me and after me. I played something very simple and got one of the accomplished guys to film me. It will go up on my Instagram soon, maybe tomorrow morning.

A jaunt in Liberty next. I have never been there before. The textiles and fabrics were amazing. They reminded me of when I would go into the Indian shops with my mum around Green street and she would buy the Indian fabrics to make her own clothes. I will definitely at some point in my life go there and get a shirt made in one of the fabric designs.

Next stop, Tate Britain. First it was the Lee Miller exhibition. I had watched the film first and this was what was informing my viewings of the photographs. I liked her modelling photographs much more than her photographs as a photographer. There was some video footage of her posing as a statue which drives a poet mad and also her messing around stroking a phallic piece of sculpture and laughing about it, so the exhibition veered into a type of pornography, an impression that was reinforced by the number of nudes of her that were being exhibited. I had studied this period of photography before and it reminded me of my many years of research.

I was somewhat envious of her life. The great difference between being a glamorous woman and being an average man (albeit a handsome one that was a genius and a god). I had never had and never would have the opportunities that she had for love or for a life of high society. She had hung around Picasso and Man Ray, the latter when she was not even famous. The life that I had wanted had never come – being friends or even lovers with artists and writers. She’d had it all.

Desultory walk through the Turner and Constable exhibition looking at the differences between them and their rivalry. I’ve never liked either of them. However, it can’t be denied that they had some spectacular and striking pieces. As I was walking through the gallery, I had the same thought that I always have in these places. The people there will never talk to you. You can’t find any friends or lovers there, any fellow lovers of art. What a degraded time that we live in.

On the way home, I shopped in Tesco and got some reduced price Black Cherry conserve, two whole jars of it. I also had a call with a friend in a country that is going through atrocities and upheaval at the moment.

At home, it was chicken curry and rice followed by hot chocolate cake and custard. Then a phone call with the one that is mine before I watched the Hindi film Dhurandhar that has raked in so much money at the worldwide box office. It was an Indian version of Hamlet where the hero goes into the enemy’s country in the name of justice and revenge. It was a tightly constructed film. Where do I sit on the controversy? India claims that the Pakistani state creates terrorists that attack India. Who knows the truth of these matters? I don’t have the information or the intelligence. Like me, the average person does not. Are Indian people, film makers and the state falsely claiming that the Pakistani state is covertly fighting them? Is this racism? The state is all about racism. That is the precondition for the modern day state, us and them. It is the state that is disgusting and corrupt. Any state. I am an anarchist. I stand for real freedom. I stand for love rather than hate. I watch the film. I don’t let the fiction influence my understanding. All states are corrupt and predicated on hate and terrorism and violence.

Finally, a long shower and then, as always, the writing to A. We are companions of the night.

power hunger

27.01.2025

S: Those that want power and that get some power, they hold onto it desperately, with everything that they have got.

A: Example?

S: Why do you think that they will not recruit from certain groups in society? It is all a game of power. Power means having in this society. It is not India where those that do not have have the greatest power. In India, the poor and the disenfranchised are the ones that control the votes. They vote more than the wealthy. Here, it is the wealthy that control the politics. Wealth is power over here. So, therefore, they try to keep some from wealth. They are gatekeepers. That is what they think power is.

A: So, the professions where the wealth is, they keep us out?

S: Precisely. There is a devilry in the deception and the defrauding that goes on here with opportunities.

A: Anything further?

S: It is also a game of sexual power. In this society, it is wealth that is seductive. The way that the wealthy are. By denying wealth, you are denying sexual power.

A: And what has happened with you?

S: I am wealthy despite them. Because someone that works as hard as me will never be poor. Someone that can do so much will never be poor. I have power. I have a voice. I have soft power. As a writer, a journalist, a photographer, an artist, as someone that shapes cultural experiences. They couldn’t stop me. I am invincible. However much they tried to keep me from power, I have power anyway. No one can stop me. I am a dominant force. What is their power before the power of The Tiger? It is nothing. What is outside of Punjab has never been able to triumph over Punjab.

the age of independence

20.01.2026

S: You know, when people tell me to become independent, I just drone it out. They are constantly saying it.

A: Are you not sick of it and them?

S: The problem is the problem of the zealot. Independence is their religion. They will have no blasphemy of their god, independence.

A: There is a criticism here.

S: This is the age of independence. And look what it has brought them. They are all sick and suffering from depression. Because they are alone and they are not connected.

A: Is that just from their independence?

S: Most likely. Do you think it is normal to live without human connections? Obviously it is not. They have made themselves sick. I’m not going to make myself sick. They have made themselves poor. I’m not going to make myself poor. It is against reason. Why would I court precarity, the precarity of independence? Again, look at their politics. They are the politics of independence.

A: What do you mean?

S: Brexit and the solitary isolation of Great Britain. Trump in America deciding that he is going to make enemies with all the world and separate himself with walls and with hate from everyone. Keeping out of the climate accords and Nato. No togetherness and no community. Not so splendid isolation all over the world with the far Right. Trade tariffs and other bullshit to try and keep the world disconnected and countries isolated from each other. It is the politics of isolation and independence. Yet these politicians are not different from the people in this country. The people always say it is not us, it is the politicians. However, these people and these politicians are all one with each other.

A: What do you think?

S: Fuck their so-called independence. We come from India. We come from Punjab. We are Tigers. We have a community. We live for the community and connection. We have a family. We live for the family and connection. We have real independence. Because we do not believe in the state. We hate the state. We believe in ourselves. The village and Punjab. We do not believe in false superiority based on race and ethnicity. We do not believe in the injustice of ‘independence’ which relies on exploitation and the mongering of hate and superiority. We are not wage slaves because the family supports us. We are not selfish, greedy and grasping because the family supports us. Our reliance on the family is not dependence. We are independent because we rely on the family. In the village and in Punjab, we have the politics of togetherness. The community comes first, not the individual and his isolation. Belonging comes first, independent identity afterwards. We don’t have the ego and arrogance to be independent in the way of these selfish countries and their politics. In their countries, we are the only ones that are independent. Because we copy no one. We follow no one. We follow our own path. The path of The Tiger. The path of the truly independent. And that is why we have self-determination. And them? They have nothing and are nothing. There is no way that they can last. Because their independence will lose them all of their power. The way of power is connection, not arrogance. The way of power is togetherness and not loneliness. The way of freedom is not the solitude of the tyrant, but the laugh of the crowd. They deal with atoms. We deal with the universe in its connections.

the impermeability and resilience of hate (microfiction)

21.11.2025

S: A lot of people think that racism is natural.

A: Why?

S: Because they have cultivated it to be so strong here. One of the most xenophobic and racist countries in the entire world.

A: Why remark upon it? They are racist but you are not allowed to say that they are. They don’t want to admit it to themselves. They are under the delusion that they are good people. They have made the country into an embarrassment.

S: The reason I bring it up is to ask you the question. Have you ever pondered upon the impermeability and resilience of hate?

A: What do you mean?

S: These haters can be around people of difference the whole day at work and so on. In different social settings, wherever. They have been around us for hundreds of years. And yet, they still hate us. We are not included in their social networks. Their deepest relationships are like for like.

A: So from that you draw the conclusion that hate is impermeable and resilient?

S: It is not, of course, everyone. There are exceptions. My closest friends are across cultures. But, speaking in general terms, all it takes is a human dung heap like Farage or Trump for them to flare up with their hate crimes. And recruit their little chickenshit scumbags to stoke the flames and rouse up these imbeciles in this society against us.

A: What is the point of pointing it out? It is not going to change anything.

S: To say the truth is an act of resistance in itself. I don’t accept the bullshit lip service narrative that they are trying to project, that racism has been cured, that there is no work to be done, that everyone is living in a rosy tinted reality holding hands. They are wrong. They are atrocious. Their society is atrocious. It is worse now with racism than when I was a kid, when the skinheads were around.

A: You want to say the truth and they want to cancel you. What is this game? Why is it worth playing?

S: One day, they will look back at this period in history and they will say that it was The Tiger that was right. It is right to be militant against their racism. It is right to criticise them. It is right to fight them. It is right to keep on saying that it does not matter what colour someone is, what culture they are from, that everyone is worthy of love and that we are all human beings.

A: But you don’t see these racists as human beings. All you do is swear at them.

S: When you become a monster, then in the story, there will be someone to kill the monster. The hero. In this story, it is The Tiger.

killing hitler (microfiction)

11.11.2025

S: There are two kinds of people. Those that would kill Hitler. And those that would not.

A: Are you just talking about Hitler?

S: That is up to you to decide. When a tyrant and a despot, a fascist, when scum takes over, should you lie back and let him fuck you? Should you let the scum dictate the terms? Or should you end it? That is the difference between a non-man and a responsible citizen. It is the key question of our times, of any time.

A: So you would kill Hitler.

S: In the cradle if I had to.

A: You could square that with your conscience?

S: Do you hear the screams of the ones that he persecuted? Do these screams haunt you? Can you hear those screams in the night?

A: You would be the judge of life and death?

S: If you do not kill Hitler, you are Hitler. You accept sin.

A: Sin, judgement, murder. What is this philosophy?

S: In the film ‘Hum’ (Us), Tiger says that there are two kinds of cockroaches. A cockroach from the gutter can make an individual sick. But a cockroach from the dirtiness of sin makes the whole of society sick.

A: Nobody believes in sin any more.

S: That is your mistake. Sin does exist. Sin is objective fact. Sin is what the Hitlers of this world commit. If evil has a face, that is it.

A: What makes you so good that you would punish sin with death?

S: Whether I am good or not, I try to be good. Whether or not there is a fight, I try to be a warrior. Whether or not I have the opportunity to make a real difference, I try to make a real difference. It is not your nature that makes you good or evil. It is what you do with what you have. We all make mistakes.

A: Hitler will never come before you. You are one of the little people. There will never be the occasion. Hitler is protected by this society. This society models itself on Hitler, despite the pretence that it does not. This society is obsessed by Hitler.

S: When there was no way, Narsimha the Man-Tiger exploded from the column to kill the tyrant that thought himself invincible. The prayer of the people is god upon earth, to kill Hitler. In my culture, the obsession is the murder of Hitler. In one corner of the world, they give birth to warriors. That is why Punjab is immortal. That is why Punjab is just. Because we kill Hitler. India’s contribution to the war against Hitler was decisive.

Escaping the Labyrinth: Equality and Diversity

(Editor Welcome written for an Equality and Diversity newsletter)

An ancient religious and spiritual metaphor, the labyrinth signifies that we are in the midst of confusion. That we have no clear path, no clear destination, that we don’t know where we are going. And therefore, that we do not know who we are. Because without purpose, we cannot find our destiny and identity.

But what is significant is that the labyrinth is an ordered structure. It is just the order of the other. That is why it is confusion. And remember, there is a solution to the labyrinth. There is an escape.

This is why I believe the idea of the labyrinth resonates with the struggle to find true equality and diversity in this world, true unity. Sometimes, we all look at the world around us that has been created by others and ask ourselves, amidst this entanglement and disorientation, can we ever find our way? Against the order of the other, how can we create an order of our own? Can we escape from this order into freedom? It is a daunting task to even begin.

Personally, I always put the example of India before me. And I think of our freedom fighters. These brave men and women were up against the greatest superpower the world had ever known. This superpower was the law. It was the government. It was the country.

But they did not shirk from the colossal challenge that was before them. They knew that they had to carve out their own path in these convoluted bureaucratic and legal structures, their own destination and their own identity from the entanglement that was presented to them.

They did it. India is free. And because she is free, she gives me hope. And I trust that she will also give the world hope. There is a legend around that either Zhou Enlai or Mao Tse-tung replied to a question about the influence of the French Revolution by saying it was too early to say. Whether or not this is true of the French Revolution, it is certainly true of the Indian Revolution. And I look forward to seeing how much of an impact this can make for all of us in this world.

the reason (microfiction)

26.09.2025

I had just spent the past hour messaging three of my friends. They had all thought of me at the same time. It was Friday evening. It was the start of the weekend and some free time. So they had all thought of me. It was nice to be thought of like that. And, in some way, it had alleviated my loneliness. I lived with my parents. I had spoken to my mother while she had cooked me a feast of paneer with pea curry, curried spinach and spiced yoghurt with a generous salad. But still I felt alone. I was always going to feel alone. There was no point not trying to feel alone. Because I was never going to meet anyone special in my life. I was going to have to sleep in a bed alone every night for the rest of my life. I didn’t kid myself.

But then, I also had Alfonso. I rang him up. Without saying hello to me, he jumped into a question. ‘Why do people look for a reason for why their life is not what they want it to be?’

‘Because there is some reason why there life is not what they want.’

Alfonso was eating something. I wondered what it was but did not ask him. ‘What is the reason your life is not what you want it to be?’ he asked me.

‘Because I am an ethnic minority.’

‘You always say that.’

‘It doesn’t mean it is not true,’ I said. ‘Do you think these racist bastards even know how racist they are? How much it governs their society? What kind of fucking scum they are? No, they don’t. Because their racism makes them think they are superior to people like me.’

‘They have close relationships with people from other countries. With immigrants.’

‘Yes. With the westernised ones. With the ones that bend to them and want to lick their boots. I come from the village. I have rejected westernisation. I am too good to lick anyone’s boots.’

‘Then your situation is your choice.’

‘No,’ I said. ‘To choose freedom over slavery is not a choice. It is a necessity.’

‘Yet you call them slaves to the state. Have they chosen that slavery?’

‘Yes, that is the tragedy. They have chosen slavery over freedom. They are slaves in their hearts and minds. Slaves that think they are the masters.’

‘They hate you because of your criticisms.’

‘Let them hate. I also despise them for judging me. For being Indian. I never forgive anyone that rejects me because of that. You are taught to nurture your relationships. Especially enmity.’

‘You will never get this war that you want.’

‘I have it already. In my thoughts and my writing. In my heart. In my books that I publish.’

‘They will never fight you. And they will stop you from fighting. If you don’t change, you will always be alone.’

‘If you let someone pull you to the ground and step all over you, you are not a man. If you let someone throw you out like garbage and rob you of your dignity, you are not a man. If you let someone put a fucking leash on you like you are a fucking dog, you are not a man. If you let someone talk over you, reject you, exclude you and you fawn over them, you are not a man. You are a piece of shit. And I am not a piece of shit. In fact, I am The Tiger. Fuck everybody.’

‘Well,’ Alfonso said. ‘Even though you are so disagreeable and angry, the wonderful thing is that you still have friends. And yet you claim that you are all alone.’

‘Where is my family?’ I said. ‘How can you think you have anyone when you don’t even have your own family?’

‘What is the lack?’ Alfonso asked. ‘Be honest. Is it the children or is it the woman?’

I didn’t answer him. Who knew the answer to that? The ache inside, who knew who or what could soothe it? Although I did know. The only way to soothe the ache was with the war. And therefore, I did not look for anyone in this world. I looked for the war. The war was something that I could work on. The war was something I could have and hold in the nights. Yes, I lay in bed thinking about the war. I woke up in the morning to wage the war. I was a warrior from the old world. Not this shitty world. War was my destiny. We had been slaves. We were slaves. But we would not be slaves tomorrow. The child of The Tiger would be a king. He would walk free. The child of The Tiger would be a Queen. She would walk with dignity. The love of the world would be his. The love of the world would be hers. The war that we fought was for tomorrow. For tomorrow. This pain that we lived in, it had a purpose. It was for tomorrow. This hunger that we had. It was for tomorrow. One day, the spark would be lit. I had to survive for that day. It might not come before the end of my life, but it would come. In the end, it is truth alone that is triumphant. Satyameva Jayaate.

Educational Poverty for Dalits in India

Dr. Suneel Mehmi

This piece was submitted for a journalism internship as a writing test. The author, Dr. Suneel Mehmi, is proud to come from the Dalit Community and to be an Untouchable.

06.09.2025

India, which has a caste system and caste discrimination against Dalits (the lowest castes) also has the largest population of 287 million illiterate adults in the world. That is 37% of the global total [1]. If illiteracy can be considered an indicator of exclusion from education, then Dalits must be considered as victims of this educational poverty and deprivation, since 62% of Dalits are illiterate indicating they have likely not completed primary school [2]. Informal data indicates that more than nearly 60% of children who drop out of school are Dalit children [3].

Caste discrimination aligns with gender discrimination to fuel illiteracy, evident in the fact that the literacy rate of female Dalits in Bihar was 38.5% in 2011 [4]. To put that into perspective and stark contrast, the literacy rate in the United Kingdom is considered to be 99% for both men and women [5].

Despite the fact that education is the best way to eradicate poverty and build a better future, this education is still systematically denied to Dalit children in India [6].

While the caste system has been abolished in the law, there is ongoing discrimination and prejudice against Dalits throughout India including in the field of education. Dalit students face unique challlenges in becoming students. The family is so poor and unemployment rates are so high that even in today’s world, Dalit children are sold into bonded labour so that they cannot study, just so that the family can eat [7]. Many Dalit children are studying while they are malnourished.

In schools, Dalit children are often bullied and discriminated against. In Bihar State in India for instance, while there is a legal obligation to include children from all castes, still schools are either abandoned or barely functioning. If Dalit children attend the schools, they are treated with cruelty or neglected. Practices of discrimination include being forced to sit at the back of the class and prevented from touching or interacting with classmates from other castes [8]. Far from being able to join in school activities, stories of verbal and physical abuse against Dalit students from both teachers and classmates are rife [9].

The dropout rate for girls is exceptionally high. Children already vulnerable due to caste prejudice are placed in even greater danger, and there is the perpetuation of a cycle of poverty which has remained unchallenged for generations [10].

Education is key to increasing the prosperity, security and happiness of any country. If there is systematic and institutionalised exclusion of the Dalit community in India from learning, then the country cannot advance as a whole. To counter poverty, we must first counter the educational poverty and deprivation for Dalits.

[1]

https://www.oxfamindia.org/featuredstories/10-facts-illiteracy-india-you-must-know

[2]

https://childrenontheedge.org/how-we-help/education/dalit-children-in-india/addressing-caste-discrimination

[3]

https://childrenontheedge.org/how-we-help/education/dalit-children-in-india/addressing-caste-discrimination

[4]

https://www.oxfamindia.org/featuredstories/10-facts-illiteracy-india-you-must-know

[5]

UNESCO Institute for Statistics (retrieved March 13, 2016) quoted at https://countrymeters.info/en/United_Kingdom_(UK)

[6]

https://www.globalcare.org/project/india-patripul-dalit-education/

[7]

https://www.globalcare.org/project/india-patripul-dalit-education/

[8]

https://childrenontheedge.org/how-we-help/education/dalit-children-in-india/addressing-caste-discrimination

[9]

https://www.globalcare.org/2018/05/poverty-and-prejudice-changing-the-story-for-dalit-children/

[10]

https://www.globalcare.org/2018/05/poverty-and-prejudice-changing-the-story-for-dalit-children/

The Kew Gardens Archive Brought to Life: The SS Great Britain Wardian Cases Exhibition at the RHS Flower Show at Hampton Court

11.07.2024
Dr. Suneel Mehmi

There were many unique characteristics of the RHS Flower Show at Hampton Court which I observed as a novice to the event. The variety of our relationships to plants and flowers in art, culture and food. The friendliness of the people there. The almost overwhelming enthusiasm. One such characteristic was that they had plant porters and also that many of the public that did without the plant porters were struggling with the structures of the plants as they flowed within the spaces. The plant structures – so beautiful to behold and so suitable to evolution and adaptation – seemed particularly unwieldy and cumbersome, and their fragility in transit was worrying. I was particularly surprised that at the very start of the morning, people were buying the plants so that they had to carry them around for the whole event, although I suppose that was so that they could get their first choice.

It was in this context that I came across the SS Great Britain Wardian Cases Exhibition. I had already seen the Wardian case at Kew Gardens for our volunteer training there, so it was not an unfamiliar sight, and I even knew some of the history behind this construction. The Wardian case is what I would describe as a life box that protects plants in a microclimate where they only need to be watered once during a two-month crossing.

Something akin to a miniature Victorian glasshouse, although made out of wood, the Wardian case has been described as a revolution in the long distance transportation of plants. Patently, the construction was where the sciences of botany and biology found their sanctuary and spring as the living plants could be studied in Europe rather than grown from seeds in a foreign land. Again, the case allowed the transportation of economically important plants and is thus one of the most significant relics in the history of modern capitalism and global development. One of the most noteworthy connections with Kew gardens is with the exportation of seedlings from our glasshouses to Ceylon and Malaya in the 1870s to begin the rubber plantations. However, Kew Gardens also habitually used Wardian cases to transport plants until 1962.

The display at the RHS Flower show was a preview of the exhibition at the SS Great Britain which is Bristol’s number one visitor attraction. On the ship’s weather deck, six reconstructed Wardian cases are on display for visitors to explore. Each is a replica of the last surviving ship-board example designs which are to be found in the Kew Gardens archive. Based on research from the Brunel Institute, studies of the ship’s cargo manifests, each case is planted with a true-to-life ‘order’. The cases will celebrate the inbound and outbound plant species that the ship transported across the world between 1859 and 1875. The exhibition highlights the role of steamships in the transportation of plants and the making of the modern world.

Along with the exhibition of the Wardian cases, there is other horticultural interest. There is a botany-themed ‘discovery talk’ and horticultural workshops. A ‘botanist’s cabin’ has also been added to the ship’s museum in which you are to become immersed in the sights, sounds and smells of life onboard – a lived experience and introduction to the important work and research of Victorian botanists and ‘plant hunters’.

The exhibition at the RHS Flower Show was an exciting and stimulating moment in time travel to a monumental period in the history of plants and in the makings of a globalised world. Looking at those fairly small boxes with such a colossal impact was a message that just a little thought and a few materials can change reality. The resourcefulness and ingenuity of the human mind can reshape everything. As we try to combat the mass extinction event that is threatening all plant life and diversity, the Wardian case stands as a symbol that improvement can be wrought to transform botany, biology, the life sciences – and the future. And the Wardian case is also a symbol of connection across the world through transport. The future is about more connection across cultures through science and study enabled through constructions like the Wardian case. And more connections with Kew Gardens, its science and its archives and knowledge to inspire the understanding of this living planet and the foundations on which it has been built.

Acknowledgements
Thank you to the SS Great Britain for allowing me to share the photographs and especially to Emily France there who was so helpful with the research and the permissions.

Review of Hugh Fox Photography Gallery: A Day in the Life: People and Places of the Old Royal Naval College

11.06.2024

Dr. Suneel Mehmi

Please note: The views in my personal review do not reflect the views of any organisation in which I work and do not reflect any kind of consensus within any organisation in which I work. This is an independent review for my non-commercial personal blog written in my free time in which I am at liberty to think and say what I want. And nobody is compelled to read what I write – I can only offer an invitation.

In the atmospheric bowels of the King William building, Hugh Fox’s photographs document the interactions of visitors with the space at the Old Royal Naval College, as well as portraits of staff and brief interviews. Visitors are thus able to learn more about what happens behinds the scenes at such a grand historic site, the tales of protection and conservation.

The first photograph is of one of the entrance gates to the attraction, the first glimpse of the beauty inside. Fox has chosen an angle which hides the building behind the trees. So there is a mystery created, a veil between the viewer and the site. There is an idea of an inner, hidden core within the building that is to be investigated. Is this an invitation to penetrate the veil? The allurement of concealment? The lamp in the middle of the archway of the entrance floats over the veil of the trees suggesting the enlightenment of obscurity. Perhaps it is also a reflection on the nature of photography which is writing with light, which promises to go deep within the exhibition.

The fact that there is a tussle between the trees in the archway and the man-made building suggests a fight between humans and nature, culture and authenticity, perhaps even the life of the trees and the stasis of stone. Does nature – and the representation of nature – win? One of the trees appears as though it is bigger than the Baroque dome of the building.

Actually, this entrance (The West Gate) was photographed by the inventor of the photograph in Great Britain, William Henry Fox Talbot in about 1839. So this photograph could possibly be a modern update of that historic photograph – particularly as Hugh Fox also has the name ‘Fox’ in his name.

The theme of enlightenment is continued in the photograph of a mother with a pram who is walking beside her daughter in the shadows. They are walking towards the lamp to the right of the image in one of the colonnades in the site. Because there are two children, perhaps we can assume that they represent the curiosity which the photographer is to kindle in the audience that are following the light of photography and its writing. Illumination is manifest in the image – the three bodies are to move from the sphere of darkness into the light just in front of them. And there is a subtlety too – the mother has one foot behind her in the pool of light. She is leading her daughter into the path of light. She is a being of light herself. The lamp itself is situated over the skyscape of the London Docklands – it represents modernity and the future rather than the Baroque of the Old Royal Naval College.

What is peculiar about the mother is that she wears a yellow coat. This was the coat that the Naval Pensioners wore as punishment in the days of the Royal Hospital for Seamen. This incidental detail may seem to complicate the image in one sense. And then, there is a further complication. Because the staff at the Old Royal Naval College also wear yellow T-shirts. Therefore, the yellow is split between goodness and badness and is ambiguous in its suggestion of the role for the mother.

Particularly interesting to someone with some familiarity of these figures is the portrait of Natalie Conboy, Collections Manager. Obviously the scholarly aspects of her work persona are emphasised and she holds a pencil in her hand. Her personality shines through in her smile: we know that she is a warm person. At the same time, she blazes spectacularly in blue, like a blue fire. Because her hair is blue and she is wearing a blue outfit. In the photograph of the mother leading her daughter into the light, the mother was wearing a blue rucksack. Is this a thematic resonance within the series of photographs here, the breaking down of the barrier between visitor and staff, like this exhibition which presents them both side to side?

But there is also a theme of blackness here. Because the blue has black tiger’s stripes pulsating through it and Natalie also wears black gloves. And there is a mirroring of the black gloves in her necklace that she wears, in which a black hand dangles as a pendant, pointing downwards so that the black hand is gesturing to the black hands below. The photograph is there a symphony of colours and hands. That portray and point to the act of writing, research. And that point to something else: a transformation of the white body into blackness with the black hands of the writer: maybe an allusion to the act of writing where the white body transmutes into the black ink which then relays personality and identity.

But again, there is the pointing towards what is concealed: the concealed hand behind the hand that writes. The hand behind the scenes. We have a meta reference to what is being portrayed in the photograph: the work that is going on behind the vision of the visitor. It is what is concealed that is the object of attraction.

And then, there is an insinuation of precarity here. Because the focus is on writing and the most visible writing in the photograph is the word ‘FRAGILE’ in capital letters on the box above Natalie’s head to the right. The gloves, of course, are to protect the collection, our precious history. They need delicate handling. So Natalie’s role as protectress is emphasised. But at the same time, she is positioned in the shot as fragile herself: she is amongst the shelves which form the background, as one of the objects in the collection…

One photograph of a man looking upwards in front of the West Wall in the Painted Hall and who is directing his smartphone as a camera has a game of arms. The figures behind him are touching his outstretched arms: the nude woman and the King. The relationships between photography, femininity and power are perhaps being explored here as the photographer reflects upon his craft. Photography here appears to be a joining with woman’s body and the photographer gives ‘the elbow’ to male power. It is indicative that all of the staff that he has photographed are women….

The torch and the image of the light makes its way again into the image of one of the friendly Volunteer Tour Guides, Chenda. She is directing the gaze of the visitors upwards with her torch. Once again, the educative mission of the charity and the site is highlighted, its leading of the viewers and the visitors to Enlightenment. It is the gaze upwards towards the heavens…

Does the posture of Chenda imitate the photograph of the mother leading her daughter to the lamp? The mother who was also wearing yellow? Because Chenda is holding her stomach as she points the torch, the place where the babies come from… The action of holding her hand there also obscures her name tag and therefore her identity as she becomes the anonymous purveyor of truth, knowledge, art and culture.

An interesting exhibit with some interesting photographs. A perspective on the site and the people that make it what it is that is well worth exploring. And, furthermore, with the use of framing devices around the site, some of the photographs were quite visually striking.

About the Author

Dr. Suneel Mehmi holds a PhD in the history of photography which was published as a monograph by Routledge – Law, Literature and the Power of Reading: Literalism and Photography in the Nineteenth Century. He is currently in the third year of an Open University Degree in Art History and Visual Culture.