Postcards From Muscat
A group exhibition based on the game: Name, Place, Animal, Thing. I sat with the idea for a while thinking about the theme that will thread through these four elements. The more time I sat with the idea, the more challenging it was proving to be. The question that kept resurfacing was: How can I photograph, in abstract, and still leave the viewer with a clue to what the subject is in my photos? After much contemplation and brainstorming, I landed on the idea of a street photography approach in nostalgia to my childhood visits to my grandparents’ house.
My aim was to capture life as it is now in contrast with my memories from my past.
Back in the 1970s, every Friday afternoon my parents would gather my brother and me in the car and drive us to Muscat to visit my grandparents. We would pass through the corniche, driving down its winding road until we reached their old traditional omani house.
Fast forward to the present day some of the corniche building facades were given a facelift and new roads were built, leaving an echo of the past. These photos resemble my memories of passing through Muttrah and old Muscat on those Friday afternoons. They were captured on a photography walk in 2021 when I visited the new fish market, the new souq entrance, and ended at the historical forts close to the grounds where my grandparent’s house once stood.
Immersing myself in the historical neighbourhood and reminiscing about the early childhood days in contrast to who I am today brought on a tug on identity and belongingness. My feelings were so profound, the only way I could express them was through my photos.
The final product is forty prints placed into a sketchbook with one fine art paper pint slid into corner sleeves on one page of a spread. I chose to order the pints in the order of the played game, Name, Place, Animal, Thing. I arranged every four photos into a similar color palette.