In the Spring of 2021, America was awash with a feeling of optimism. Back in my home country there was a storm brewing. By the time I got my first vaccine shot the news coming out of India was bleak, the collective grief spilling over my social media feed - the government of India no longer able to obfuscate the ground realities. Their propaganda, drowned out by the anger and anguish of thousands who just wanted to save their loved ones.
Spring Allergies is a project that came about while looking back at the images that I made during this period. These images are used in conjunction with appropriated text from twitter, tracing back my social media consumption during this timeline. The words float in between and sometimes with the images, to capture the mental state I was in, even though I was surrounded by the hopefulness of spring, in a land 8000 miles away.
This project is a criticism of the failure of the Indian government, and tries to reimagine visual aarepresentation which came under a lot of fire during this period. It also is an attempt to stand with the journalists that were vilified for doing their work and not towing the line in furthering the government’s propaganda. It is also a realization of the privilege I am afforded by having immigrated to America, while still being affected by the unrecognizable mutating face of my home country.
