“The exhibition is a recap of where I’ve been and what I’ve been through and who I’ve been with.” This is how Girish Gopinathan has prepared his solo photo exhibition, Panoramas But Not Quite, which will open on November 28 at the College of Fine Arts, Thiruvananthapuram.
This experienced photojournalist from Thiruvananthapuram is a trained painter, a photographer and a documentarian – three roles he played at the beginning of this project.
This showcase is a collection of extended compositions, including diptych (with two panels) and triptych (with three panels) montages captured over the last three decades that shaped Girish’s identity as a storyteller and documentarian.
Today’s Headlines by Girish Gopinathan | Photo Courtesy: Girish Gopinathan
Each installation brings together a series of photographs, capturing similar subjects from different perspectives. The images seamlessly blend with each other, creating the illusion that the photos were taken at the same time. Girish had photographed in India and Sri Lanka during his tenure as a photojournalist.
“We wait for hours at different locations during our assignments. And often, we are unable to bring together all the elements surrounding a subject in a single, wide-angle frame – hence, losing the essence of the subject. As a solution, you shoot more from different angles, and when we stitch these images together, it takes on a new meaning,” says Girish, who thought of the exhibition in 2010 and has been creating images for the project ever since. Compiling.
The show includes 40 works captured on film and digital media. The photographic installations are inspired by the techniques of American visual media artist, Man Ray.
“The collection’s two first works, Puffs and Politics and Still, Age of Fear, were shot in 2005. It is set in Cuddalore and Nagapattinam, Tamil Nadu, respectively, after the 2004 tsunami that wreaked havoc on the state’s coastline,” says Girish.
Puffs and Politics by Girish Gopinathan | Photo Courtesy: Girish Gopinathan
Photographers say that this medium enabled them to perform their routine tasks in a different way. “Instead of limiting myself to just the aesthetics of the photographs, I searched for a reason to tell that story. While the artist in me was curious about how light, color, shadow, and subjects work, the documentarian in me was determined to stay true to the reality of the events without controlling the settings too much.”
Girish places a special emphasis on the mundane through his works, aiming to achieve a sense of universality – be it the photographs set in the furious traffic of Bengaluru or the many panels depicting children jumping into the swollen Narmada river in the hope of finding coins from the riverbed. “I’m not talking about places, I’m talking about lives,” he says.
Pilgrimage and Heritage Travel in Madhya Pradesh by Girish Gopinathan | Photo Courtesy: Girish Gopinathan
The show also featured photographs from Thiruvananthapuram where Girish spent his student days. Another installation displayed a poignant sequence showing migrant laborers returning to their villages from Delhi during the pandemic.
“I started processing the images in 2019 and organized an online show with 20 works in 2020, which was well received globally. That’s when I realized the potential of this photo series. In 2023, I started working on releasing the book Panorama But Not Quite Photomontage, which was launched by Kerala Governor Rajendra Arlekar ahead of the exhibition.”
Yesterday by Girish Gopinathan Photo Courtesy: Girish Gopinathan
“The biggest challenge was identifying images that had the potential to connect in this way. In the beginning, people didn’t understand my idea. Only when they see the product are they convinced about what I tried to convey with my work.”
Regarding the future of this project the photographer says, “These works are about observing, constantly finding something new from the same subject, even if they have something new to say. Over time, I hope to explore something with the same subject in different locations.”
Panorama But Not Quite will be at the College of Fine Arts, Thiruvananthapuram from November 28 to December 5.
published – November 26, 2025 11:30 am IST