Kochi when it's wet

Andre Luetzen, a German photographer, had visited Kochi during the monsoon in 2014, a time tourists seldom choose to visit the place. But he was no ordinary tourist and was here to study the lives of cityfolk when it rains and take photographs that would later become part of his trilogy series on the theme, ‘Climate and living conditions’. It took Andre some time to edit and arrange the images in the form of a narrative in the book titled Inside Out Kochi, the second one in the trilogy.  Inside Out Kochi was launched on February 19 in Berlin. Similar to his first book, Zhili Byli, which features people from the Russian city of Arkhangelsk, Inside Out Kochi takes a look at the way people go about their lives during the monsoon in Kochi.

“I travelled to the harbour city as the Goethe Institute and the Kochi Muziris Biennale Foundation invited me to do a residence project here. I stayed in Kochi for four weeks documenting the lives of people, both young and old, men and women. I was mostly interested in their habitats and how they arranged themselves inside and outside of it,” says Andre.

“I really enjoyed the time I spent in Kochi. I worked with a translator to communicate with the people and this was truly enriching.”  Besides the monsoon, which becomes a major theme in his book, Andre describes the culture and living conditions in the city in Inside Out Kochi. “The book changes inside and outside in a certain rhythm. The streets are wet, and humidity hangs in the air when it rains in Kochi. People hardly move; there is a sense of immobility everywhere. The photographs also depict a city and its people who are stuck between modernity and tradition, in search of an identity. Changes in climate, various political influences and cultural events like the biennale are bringing a new identity to the place. It further takes a look at the colonial past, the difficult economic situation that makes it hard for many people to survive, and the uncertain future of the region,” he explains.

If ‘Inside Out Kochi’ revolves around monsoon, Andre’s first book Zhili Byli was about winter in the Russian city of Arkhangelsk. He captured the city at a temperature of -20 degrees. The third book in the series, focusing on heat, will be about the desert climate at Khartoum in Sudan. What made Andre embark on ‘climate and living conditions’? “Change in the world is based on the change in climate. My works are not comparing different climate zones. It rather looks at how climate changes alter living spaces,” says Andre.

He chose photography as it has universal appeal.  “It is a universal language. Anyone can read it without difficulty. My pictures are compact with information, situation, and atmosphere of that particular moment,” adds Andre who puts great effort to get the perfect outcome. Once, he had joined a UN patrol boat for six weeks and went up to the river to get pictures that are in tune with the story of one of his favourite books — Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.
Now, he is busy with his third book that is to be released in 2017. He also wants to do another project on Kerala. “I would like to do a project about ‘coming of age’ in Kerala,” he sums up.