Grain elevator pictures seek passage to India

Jayaram Varada has taken a series of photographs of Saskatchewan grain elevators and hopes to exhibit his work in Kerala, India.

Varada has been taking pictures of grain elevators across the Prairies for three years. He has created a kickstarter campaign, offering reproductions of his work, with the ultimate goal of mounting an exhibit in May in Kerala, a state in southwest India.

Varada, who moved to Saskatchewan in 2009,  said he was struck by how a grain elevator has become a symbol of a town's identity.

"The whole idea of seeing this building as an icon of that town actually really fascinated me," he said. "So I was drawn into and started taking pictures of it."

Varada said he also thinks that an audience in India will appreciate the images and gain a better understanding of Saskatchewan rural life.

"Life in India and countries in the East is being displayed in Western countries but it doesn't happen the other way around [and] it should," Varada said.

He was invited to participate in an exhibit by the art department at the Indian Institute of Technology and hopes his kickstarter campaign will enable him to cover such expenses as framing his work.

As part of his campaign, Varada has posted digitally edited pictures from his photography project so far.

"They are photographs digitally edited to look like a painting," he explained. "The final project will contain minimally edited  photographs in their original state in the best possible quality."

The exhibition is named "Iconic Grain Elevators and Life in Western Canada" and will portray 60 of his photographs from Saskatchewan.