Entering a space is often an invitation to an exhibition of photography, a sensory attempt at learning the visual language. The exhibition on Ustaad Zakir Hussain photos by the legendary documentary photographer and artist Dayanita Singh was an education on how an archive to remember an icon, which captured the public imagination for decades, is done. The photos tell a story, of the artist, of the photographer and the act of taking the photo, and when to not take one is a story is itself. The editing of the photos and the sequencing of it, with the music of Zakir Hussain in the background is a way to remember the icon of ‘Wah Taj’ in a particular way.

The writer, Geoff Dyer who is an erudite commentator on the world of photography over many books and essays, led the dialogue with a deftness which only an acute observer of the realm of art and music can facilitate. An hour of conversation, was equal to a deep lesson on the art of taking the image. I had met, Mr. Dyer in Kuala Lumpur where Seni Pusaka had organised a dialogue at the tony Cult Gallery with the Malaysian public intellectual, Mr. Eddin Khoo. The tuak had nicely watered the conversational setting.

I am a compulsive photographer and writer, and do it in the spirit of documentation, in the same vain as Dayanita Singh. It gives me great joy that documentation itself is an art, or a means to it. The role that access and social capital plays in the art was a significant acknowledgement in the dialogue. As the final moments literally before the exhibition closes, it was a moment of celebration for the work of Dayanita Singh and the memory of Ustaad Saab, who was ‘charm personified’. These archives are what remain of an icon, as the photo returns the person from death, paraphrasing Barthes.