Encountering Photographic Citizens: Christopher Pinney at Photo State

In this continuing video, Prof Christopher Pinney further expands on his work as part of the lecture Photo State. Moderated by Senjuti Mukherjee,this special talk was delivered for the platform on 19 August 2022, to mark World Photography Day. Pinney addressed questions around the formulation of world photography systems as sites where diverse forms of media production and circulation exist and thrive outside of the mainstream. He also spoke about the origins of his interest in studying Indian visual culture and industrial life in rural India, apart from responding to inquiries emerging from his observations and theoretical formulations from the field.

Christopher Pinney is Professor of Anthropology and Visual Culture at University College London. Pinney’s research has a strong geographic focus in Central India. His initial ethnographic research was concerned with village-resident factory workers. Subsequently, he researched popular photographic practices and the consumption of Hindu chromolithographs in the same area. His publications combine contemporary ethnography with the historical archaeology of particular media, including his seminal books Camera Indica: The Social Life of Indian Photographs (1997) and Photos of the Gods: The Printed Image and Political Struggle in India (2004). His other publications include Photography’s Other Histories (2003, edited with Nicolas Peterson), The Coming of Photography in India (2008), Photography and Anthropology (2011) and Artisan Camera: Studio Photography from Central India (2013, with Suresh Punjabi). Most recently, he led a collaborative project funded by the European Research Council, titled “Citizens of the Camera: Photography and the Political Imagination”.

(Featured image courtesy of Christopher Pinney.)

Recorded on 19 August 2022.

In case you missed it, watch the first part of the video where Pinney delivers his lecture here.

To learn more about Christopher Pinney’s work, read Anisha Baid’s two part explication of his essay “Seven Theses on Photography” and Arushi Vats’ reflection on the archive of Suresh Punjabi.