Vanishing Giants (invitation to a book launch and photo exhibition in Singapore)
Posted by John Roberts at Sat, 03 Nov 2007 06:55:00 GMT and is filed under Book Review,Public Service Broadcast 
...for almost as long as I've been into elephants a friendly photographer named Palani Mohan has been popping in and out of elephant camps and events putting together a book called "Vanishing Giants: Elephants of Asia".
The book is finally ready for its Asian launch in Singapore on the 23rd of this month and is also available for pre-order in Europe on Amazon for those of you who cannot go along and have a peek.
None of our mob from the Anantara or Four Seasons camps made it in but there are quite a few from Thailand; Surin and street scenes, King's Cup and Elephant Nature Park as well as my old Nepali friends, Sri Lankan eles and a smattering from Angkor and, I think, Burma.
For those of you in Singapore please do go along to the Arts House (+65 6332 6900) either for the grand opening on the 23rd or to see Palani's prints on display at the same venue from the 20th to the 30th.
The book is finally ready for its Asian launch in Singapore on the 23rd of this month and is also available for pre-order in Europe on Amazon for those of you who cannot go along and have a peek.
None of our mob from the Anantara or Four Seasons camps made it in but there are quite a few from Thailand; Surin and street scenes, King's Cup and Elephant Nature Park as well as my old Nepali friends, Sri Lankan eles and a smattering from Angkor and, I think, Burma.
For those of you in Singapore please do go along to the Arts House (+65 6332 6900) either for the grand opening on the 23rd or to see Palani's prints on display at the same venue from the 20th to the 30th.
fovea exhibitions | beacon gallery invites you to:
RECEPTION FOR THE PHOTOGRAPHER
Saturday, March 8, 4pm–8pm
143 Main Street, Beacon, New York
EXHIBIT DATES: March 8 to May 4, 2008
Open Friday though Sunday, 11am to 6pm, and by appointment
Educational programs, please call 845 765 2199
or e-mail: info@FoveaEditions.org
Presented with the gracious support of:
Fovea is a registered 501(c)3 non-for-profit educational charity.
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Indian photographer Palani Mohan first encountered elephants through his mother's worship of Ganesh, the Hindu god of luck and auspicious beginnings, who carries an elephant head on a human body to symbolize harmony between the two species. Later, traveling through Asia as a photojournalist, he encountered these gentle giants firsthand and observed "how closely we live with elephants," he says. "Elephants and humans are competing for space in Asia so much that their habitat is fast declining."
Mohan was drawn to photograph elephants wherever he went for magazine shoots. He followed the elephant trail through 11 countries—including India, Sri Lanka, Burma, Thailand and Cambodia—and gradually evolved into an environmentalist, recording through his images the sad plight of a vanishing species.
Mohan's collection of black-and-white images, shot over six "very long" years, is now a handsome big-format book, "Vanishing Giants: Elephants of Asia" ( Editions Didier Millet), with a foreword by British environmentalist David Bellamy. In the cover image, a hand reaches out to hold an elephant's extended trunk, embodying the idea of relationship. Inside, most photos similarly focus on the tangled connection between man and beast. Some are loving: one memorable shot depicts an elephant "kissing" a young Thai conservationist. Others depict captured elephants crushed into tight crates, or being poked with sharp tridents to break them in; one image reveals a weeping elephant, a tear trickling from one eye.
In the end, Mohan says, "We Asians have to figure out whether we love or hate these animals." As his own images so starkly reveal, the answer is not always clear-cut.
© 2008
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