The emptiness in the room. From a photograph by Fariha

Dhaka, July 2022. © Fariha Jannat Mim

Wandering on Instagram I happened to find, through a page of Asian Women Street Photographers, the profile of a very interesting photographer from Bangladesh, Fariha Jannat Mim.

I started looking at photographs of her in which there are very often female figures as the subject.

Among all these images, one of them, in particular, struck me.

From that sharing, a long discussion was born and I would say, also a friendship. Modern power of social media.

It's a photograph that I could really talk about at length, from different points of view.

I like to share my impressions with you.

It is a photo taken in Dhaka, in an interior, in July 2022.

It portrays three women, or rather three parts of women, in black and white.

Before knowing the story behind the image I told Fariha what it reminded me of and her wonder at the precise description then sparked our friendship.

First of all, in a somewhat cheeky way, I have always thought that there is a feminine touch in photographs; or rather, it rarely happens, but sometimes it is possible to understand (or feel) that a certain photograph was taken by a woman. It will be a matter of sensitivity, of “being in the scene”, which is very feminine.

The example that always comes to mind is the photographs taken by Mary Ellen Mark in the Indian brothel on Falkland Road, which I have already talked about at length in this blog.

The closeness and the “nakedness” of the soul, more than of the bodies, of the prostitutes a few meters from the photographer leave the feeling that only a female gaze, devoid of any pre-judices, like that of Mark, could reach such high-level proximity.

Well, this same feeling immediately gave me the photo of Fariha.

And perhaps the secret lies precisely in that foot on the bed, which is understood to be that of the photographer.

She confessed to me that when she saw it in the frame, she wanted to take it off but, in the end, she let it in.

Good choice.

Not only because it increases the depth of the image because it reveals her presence, she makes us understand that she is shooting from sitting in front of the two women, but because she tells us that she is their friend. There is a deep intimacy.

There is a woman sitting on the ground with her face resting on the knee of another woman of which only her hand can be seen caressing the head. The woman on the ground has her eyes closed, but it is clear that her gaze is heavy.

It is the intimate moment of a woman who is maybe telling her friends about a problem who console her.

“Kotha”, it said in the Bangla language, the speeches, the chatter.

That purely feminine moment of confession and consolation.

Fariha then confirmed to me that this is exactly what had happened. About two of her friends sharing the same house have found themselves in the room of one of them to tell problems. And thanks to that foot it seems that we have the privilege of sitting on the left of the photographer: you understand her position from the perspective of the gaze and from the fact that it is her right foot.

She shows us this scene that otherwise would have remained the private moment of three friends.

Any photographer unrelated to women would never have left their foot in the scene, just as they are always careful not to let their shadow enter.

Here, the intimacy of this photo is very, very feminine. Delicate.

Fariha Jannat Mim. Kamalapur, 2019. © Kishor Mahmood

The second thing that interested me, and perhaps the part that got us talking the longest, is how empty this is.

There are three subjects but most of the space is occupied by the room. There are fragments of bodies.

An arm, part of a leg, half bust of the seated woman, and a foot.

It reminds me of Samuel Beckett's plays.

It's not that easy to have so much empty space with three subjects.

That's when Ludwig Wittgenstein, my nemesis, came out again.

Speaking of languages and the importance of the use of words, Fariha asked me which author was to know and I could only name him.

She read my article about him and was struck by the statement of how the meaning of a sentence lies in the empty space between the words that we fill with meaning.

The Austrian philosopher's theory of the second period fits perfectly in this photograph. Thanks to its being empty.

As if the space of the room amplified the worries or secret sadness of the woman sitting on the ground.

Or rather, it leaves us the complete freedom to fill ourselves, with our meanings, the silence, and the enigma of these fragments of bodies.

This is a highly symbolic power that has been studied for a long time in anthropology, ever since the interpretations of cave paintings.

The more essential and minimal the signs, the more they become charged with symbolism.

The voice of the shaman who sings incomprehensible words manages to cure the patient precisely because the latter charge those mysterious formulas with their meanings, suggesting him.

Of course, we're just talking here about a simple photograph taken in a Dhaka apartment in July.

But I believe that its mysterious and silent emptiness is the charm of this magnetic photograph.

And it is also an excellent example to make Wittgenstein's theory of language understood.

Fariha is still young, not even thirty years old but has already been shooting for six years and it shows. He also made a short film in 2019, “A Question”.

Born and raised in Kamalapur, she is the daughter of Dhaka and loves her city deeply.

I suggest you go and see her photo gallery.

She knows how to tell Dhaka in a very personal way.

 

FB & IG:

Fariha Jannat Mim

@farihajannat_

Italian version