A while ago a friend of mine gave me a call and told me she had recently visited an insane asylum. There, one of the staff had told her that they needed identification photos for the inmates and she asked me to do it for them voluntarily and free of charge. I very much welcomed this opportunity.
Subsequently, one day I coordinated a visit and went there equipped with my photographic outfit. This turned out to be one of my best experiences. In that day I photographed all seventy inmates with age-range between fourteen and sixty. Photographing some of them was very arduous and time-consuming. Because, they constantly move their heads, therefore focusing and framing the shots was hard but at the same time spending time with them was very enjoyable.
They say eyes are the window to the human soul. And one of the delightful things for me while photographing the seventy people was that they were themselves and you could feel all their emotions and personalities in their eyes and countenances. They were authentic. This window was wide open to my camera. Where as when I take picture of normal persons I could not have them the same way easily, because people wear masks on their faces all the time.
When I wanted to select 10 shots from the 70 for this series the hardship began. I love all of them so much that it made it hard for me to choose from them. I was staring at them for hours. I‘d rather have all of them in this series, because, every each one of them has a different story to tell.
