KETAKI SHETH : A CERTAIN GRACE
Uma Nair
Working with a black and white palette capturing sensitive and haunting images, photographer Ketaki Sheth’s ‘A Certain Grace’ documenting the lives of the Sidis, immigrants from east Africa, was a deeply moving collection of photographs, reviews. Ketaki’s work, called “A Certain Grace”, documents the lives of theSidis, Indians of African descent, living in India. Devika Daulat Singh,the chic Director of Photoink who has transformed the photography
scene single handedly in the capital city has hung Ketaki’s show with sensitivity and flair at the National Gallery of Modern Art (NGMA).
Ketaki’s images of the Sidis are black-and-white, austere and deeply stirred by the signature of solitaire, with abject desolation and melancholic moods staring out of the square sturdy frames.Says Ketaki Sheth, “I first encountered the Sidi in 2005 on a family holiday to the Gir forest in Gujarat. This community of African origin became my photographic obsession.Over the next seven years I traveled to remote towns and villages, mostly in Gujarat, Hyderabad and
Karnataka, taking pictures of the Sidi, an ethnic group from east Africa
that came to India more than 400 years ago.”
The show is about the power of portraits. And between the silent
blush of the innocent naïve girl on the cover and the many little
children, there is a melody of intriguing sadness that rings through this
fascinating odyssey.
As she stood and gently unraveled her tale, Ketaki seemed to be
a symbolic signature of the title of her book ‘A Certain Grace’. Her
narrative of the cover image was riveting.
Ketaki Sheth tinges the Sidi world through her black-and-white
palette bringing a book that will have 75 large and 13 small images
urging the reader to explore this hardly-known community. Sidis are
primarily Indians who came from Africa, some even a millennium ago.
Ketaki herself discovered them by chance; “I was on a family holiday
to the Gir in Gujarat, in 2004, when we drove through a Sidi village,
Sirwan, in the forest. It had been given to them by an erstwhile nawab in
recognition of their services. I was intrigued and explored the subject.”
“Ashiyana was soon to marry