Dhaka hosts 'Asia's largest photography festival'

Dhaka became a city of photographs from Friday, as Chobi Mela-V kicked off, "Asia's largest photography festival", according to its organisers.

Featuring over 60 exhibitions with 1,000 works by artists from 33 countries, the festival's launch featured two outstanding intellectuals Mahasweta Devi and Noam Chomsky taking on the subject of 'Freedom', the theme of this year's Mela.

Indian social activist, Magsaysay award winner and writer Devi inaugurated the festival by cutting the ribbon for an exhibition titled 'A Long Walk to Freedom', recreating the life and history of Nobel peace laureate Nelson Mandela, at the National Museum.

She later 'met' with renowned linguist, political philosopher and author Chomsky by live video conference at the Goethe Institute to discuss the festival's theme in a lively hour-long debate that began at 8.30pm.

Shahidul Alam, director of the festival says the world mostly associates photographs from Bangladesh with poverty, floods or cyclones.

"Our aim was to move away from this tradition and show the world photographs of every type of joy and sorrow."

The Chobi Mela, first launched in 1993, will run from Jan 30 to Feb 20 this year and its aim is to attract visitors from all walks of life.

"Over sixty exhibitions, over thirty participating nations, well over a thousand images, and over fifty visiting artists from Asia alone, are impressive statistics, but the emphasis on figures is misleading," say the festivals' organisers.

"The dozen or so workshops, the weeklong sessions of presentations, debates, lectures and discussions … will perhaps be what the visitors remember the most."

The works of top class photographers from Bangladesh and around the world will be shown at 63 exhibitions in 11 venues around the capital, including prominent galleries and open spaces like Karwan Bazar.

source: bdnews24.com