Girlhood in India
By: Louk Vreeswijk
| Aperture: | f/6.3 |
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| Focal Length: | 27.2mm |
| Shutter: | 1/0 sec |
This photo, the girl on this photo, moves me deeply. With her still young, prematurely aged face, marked by the circumstances of a life in poverty, she is of a heartbreaking beauty. I admire her, feel sorry for her, would like to caress her on her head, hug her.
She looks at me with a surprised, faintly bewildered expression on her face.
A moment later her crying little sister or brother demands her motherly attention and she turns her now sincerely concerned face to the back, in a gesture of solace.
I have been looking at these pictures for a long, long time. And I know, with all the ambivalent feelings they evoke, that this is the face of India that touches me right in the heart. Over the last 40 years it has embedded itself in my mind in different forms.
Every now and then, when I’m on the verge of despair because of the many faces of hypocrisy, indifference, falsehood, lust for power, greed, with which we are confronted every now and then, I have to search again for this face and take a deep look into its eyes.
Photos of the week: Ramgarh, Jharkhand, India 2013
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