A photographer’s tribute to ‘lesser humans’

Explore the haunting parallels between Holocaust and Palestine through powerful photographs at Kerala Lalithakala Akademi Art Gallery in Kozhikode.

Can the oppressed actually learn the art of oppression from oppressors? ‘Yours is not to reason why lesser humans’, an exhibition of photographs by Sudeesh Yezhuvath at the Kerala Lalithakala Akademi Art Gallery in Kozhikode, delves into this question.

Mr. Yezhuvath, an IT entrepreneur, visited the Auschwitz concentration camp in Germany out of sheer interest. It was much later that he realised the need to showcase the haunting images of Holocaust that he brought back. Parallels between the Holocaust and much recent happenings in Palestine came up gradually. “The fundamental thought that produced the cruelties of the Holocaust and Palestine is the same- Dehumanisation. It has been used for centuries to justify colonisation, racism, slavery, casteism, progroms and genocides,” observes Murali Cheeroth, one of the curators of the show, in his preface.

“I could not ignore the parallel as our country seems to be heading in the same direction,” Mr. Yezhuvath said.

The photographer has taken pains to convey the gravity of the situation using audio-visual presentations and collages carefully curated by Murali Cheeroth and Jayaraj Sundaresan. Visitors are often left speechless with the surge of overwhelming emotions after seeing the images from Auschwitz.

A series of collages of war pictures from Palestine, carefully arranged mugshots of Palestinian children and the macro level close-ups of distraught faces do not prepare one for the well laid out images of Auschwitz though. Images of personal possessions of the prisoners at Auschwitz such as footwear, spectacles, coffee mugs, prayer mats, watches and even artificial limbs confiscated by the Nazis from prisoners and then carefully segregated into heaps dominate the show and are often repeated. But rather than seeming repetitive, they play a major role in conveying the extent of the sufferings the Jews endured at the hands of the Nazis.

The exhibition that began on February 17 will conclude on February 27.