Capturing Life, a selection of photos from Auroville across four decades (1980 to 2020) by the late photographer, John Mandeen, will be featured at Centre d’ Art, Auroville, till August 10..

John passed away on July 7, last year, and this exhibition — organised by Franz Fassbender, founder of Prisma, one of the Auroville units that specialises in publishing and distributing books— is a homage to John’s time spent in India and spotlights Auroville through his lens. John, who grew up in northern California on the Pacific coast north of Big Sur and Carmel, came to India at the age of 24, in 1968. A month later, he ended up in Pondicherry at the Aurobindo Ashram, where he was accepted by the Mother (Mirra Alfassa) as an ashramite.

John Mandeen
| Photo Credit:
SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

“He was an artist whose medium of expression ended up being photography,” says Sunaina Mandeen, his wife of 43 years. John acquired his first serious camera, a Pentax SLR in a rather unusual way. An Australian friend of his, who needed money to return to Australia from Auroville, offered to sell him his camera. Before this, John only owned a simple point-and-shoot camera.

“He was totally self-taught. He started reading a lot, he would get whatever photography magazines he could lay his hands on, and at one point, his sister from America used to subscribe and send him photography magazines through post,” recalls Sunaina.

The Banyan tree. The physical centre of Auroville, next to the Matrimandir as captured by John Mandeen.
| Photo Credit:
John Mandeen

John, through his reading, learned that processing black and white film with cold water yielded the best results. Lacking a refrigerator back then, he would cycle to an ice factory, buy a large block of ice, cycle home, and use the ice to cool the developing tanks for his film processing. “He loved cameras, lenses and all accessories as much as the darkroom equipment and the process of developing and printing high quality photos. But most of all, he loved taking photos,” says Sunaina.

He also taught photography at the Last School in Aspiration township to many children in Auroville.

Auroville family cycling after work.
| Photo Credit:
John Mandeen

Recently, he had been working with the Sri Aurobindo Ashram Archives on a new book. “He worked only with natural light. There is a certain kind of beauty and poise in the photographs of John, which is something that people need to be reminded of through the exhibition,” says Sunaina.

The exhibition will be featured at Centre d’ Art, Auroville till August 10. Tuesday to Friday 2pm to 5.30pm and Saturday 10am to 12.30pm and 2pm to 5.30pm