I met Vivek Mathew years ago at his first photography show and he has progressively delved deeper and deeper in the core of his passion for images, for light and shadows, for the ripple of textures, for the music of silence and photographed the most unlikely of objects and themes with startling perspective and insight. It is easy to capture the extraordinary but it takes more than just talent to spot the pulse of divinity in the commonplace. To see in a time worn wall, a sunburst of colours. In his latest show Canvas Wall, that premiered recently at the Sublime Art Gallery, at UB City, Bangalore,  his camera captures stories told by rain, time, peeling paint, exposed bricks, reflections, shards of light, trembling shadows, lonely windows all on the surface of walls.

The walls  are narrators of neglect, abuse, defacement and the passage of time they have weathered. And Vivek’s camera has the time to pause, listen, empathise and absorb every fading patina, every scar. He not just focusses on the minutest details but sees them in a larger context of literally the big picture. He does not just say,”Look at this, this is worth your gaze.” He says, “Look at this part..look at what it says about the whole.”

Vivek’s work does not dwell upon perfection but on the stuff we overlook and walk past. In his hands, a wall becomes the canvas of an impressionist painter, the template of a graphic artist. An abandoned  room becomes a Guru Dutt set from Kagaz Ke Phool. Shadowy leaves stroll across a tapestry of textures. The reflection of a lone bird on a wire becomes a heart-stopping punch line in a patchwork of patinas.

Vivek does not see the obvious but what lies beneath and beyond the over articulated imagery we are familiar with in decorative photography. His work does not make us see. It makes us feel. And react. And wonder. And turns the world into a tactile place full of mystery, pathos and wistfulness.

Reema Moudgil is the author of Perfect Eight. (http://www.flipkart.com/perfect-eight-reema-moudgil-book-9380032870) . More on Story Wallahs.  Also check other books by Unboxed Writers in our Store.