Madhur Dhingra Dhin
My name is Madhur Dhingra and I am an Impressionist / Surreal / Fine Art Photographer based both in Toronto (Canada) & New Delhi (India). I was born an only child to my parents in Delhi, into a family torn apart by the aftermath of the India-Pakistan partition. The India-Pakistan partition bloodbath resulted my then affluent family living in Pakistan to migrate to New Delhi - India. This migration was so sudden that my family had to leave Pakistan overnight completely penniless, leaving everything behind. This resulted in massive insecurity within the family members.
Though born much later in Delhi I was literally forced to inherit all that trauma, never being allowed to forget the naked scars of partition. I joined the Merchant Navy at the age of seventeen, as a deck cadet leaving college in the first year itself. I loved this new experience and was good at learning navigation.
After some years restlessness and void set in. I was in a dilemma, now trying out new ways to end this emptiness. Photography came to me as a fulfillment of this void that has plagued me since childhood. I studied photography at the prestigious art institute "Triveni Kala Sangam" situated in Mandi House, New Delhi, India. I later started shooting product photography for all major advertising agencies. I have held solo shows in India, France and some are due to come up in America in 2024 and 2025. Many international magazines have published my work. Life for me as a photographer continues.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
My images are a part of a personal journey where I search answers to some fundamental questions about life, its meaning and purpose and later trying to understand the ultimate nature of Reality. This quest is taking me to every nook and corner of India including nearby Himalayan states and countries like Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim, Zanskar, Ladakh (Little Tibet) meeting Buddhist philosophers, Vedantic yogis, agnostics spiritualists, scientists and charlatans alike. Many of my images have been shot in remote Himalayan monasteries dating back 1500 years or more.
Constant interaction with brilliant Vedic & Buddhist scholars has made me understand that the whole concept of a 'Creator God' proposed by organized religions is a childish one. It had failed to fully comprehend That unconditioned, non-dual, eternal, omnipresent force. God is not a glorified ‘personality' sitting somewhere in the universe, directing lives of its people or attending to minute details of its day to day operations. We need to understand that the Universal Mind does not exist separately along the universe but in it and as it.
The universe was not arbitrarily created by any outside intervention but is self- born and is governed by the eternal Law of Cause and Effect. The impressions of all objects in the universe lie dormant within the inner depths of the Universal Mind, until they become active by the working of Karma. They are then projected in our familiar space-time dimension which we know as the material world. The universe is not only self-actuating but also self-determining.
As I continue on my unfinished search I find it pertinent to quote a sanskrit shlok (verse) written 3000 years ago by a Indian monk named Adi Shankracharya.
मनोबुद्ध्यहङ्कार चित्तानि नाहं न च श्रोत्रजिह्वे न च घ्राणनेत्रे । न च व्योम भूमिर्न तेजो न वायुः चिदानन्दरूपः शिवोऽहम् शिवोऽहम् ॥१॥
Translation: Neither am I the Mind, nor Intelligence nor Ego, Neither am I the organs of Hearing (Ears), nor that of Tasting (Tongue), Smelling (Nose) or Seeing (Eyes), Neither am I the Sky (Space), nor the Earth (Matter), Neither the Fire nor the Air, I am the Ever Pure Blissful Consciousness;
I am Shiva, I am Shiva !!!!!!
My name is Madhur Dhingra and I am an Impressionist / Surreal / Fine Art Photographer based both in Toronto (Canada) & New Delhi (India). I was born an only child to my parents in Delhi, into a family torn apart by the aftermath of the India-Pakistan partition. The India-Pakistan partition bloodbath resulted my then affluent family living in Pakistan to migrate to New Delhi - India. This migration was so sudden that my family had to leave Pakistan overnight completely penniless, leaving everything behind. This resulted in massive insecurity within the family members.
Though born much later in Delhi I was literally forced to inherit all that trauma, never being allowed to forget the naked scars of partition. I joined the Merchant Navy at the age of seventeen, as a deck cadet leaving college in the first year itself. I loved this new experience and was good at learning navigation.
After some years restlessness and void set in. I was in a dilemma, now trying out new ways to end this emptiness. Photography came to me as a fulfillment of this void that has plagued me since childhood. I studied photography at the prestigious art institute "Triveni Kala Sangam" situated in Mandi House, New Delhi, India. I later started shooting product photography for all major advertising agencies. I have held solo shows in India, France and some are due to come up in America in 2024 and 2025. Many international magazines have published my work. Life for me as a photographer continues.
ARTIST’S STATEMENT
My images are a part of a personal journey where I search answers to some fundamental questions about life, its meaning and purpose and later trying to understand the ultimate nature of Reality. This quest is taking me to every nook and corner of India including nearby Himalayan states and countries like Nepal, Bhutan, Sikkim, Zanskar, Ladakh (Little Tibet) meeting Buddhist philosophers, Vedantic yogis, agnostics spiritualists, scientists and charlatans alike. Many of my images have been shot in remote Himalayan monasteries dating back 1500 years or more.
Constant interaction with brilliant Vedic & Buddhist scholars has made me understand that the whole concept of a 'Creator God' proposed by organized religions is a childish one. It had failed to fully comprehend That unconditioned, non-dual, eternal, omnipresent force. God is not a glorified ‘personality' sitting somewhere in the universe, directing lives of its people or attending to minute details of its day to day operations. We need to understand that the Universal Mind does not exist separately along the universe but in it and as it.
The universe was not arbitrarily created by any outside intervention but is self- born and is governed by the eternal Law of Cause and Effect. The impressions of all objects in the universe lie dormant within the inner depths of the Universal Mind, until they become active by the working of Karma. They are then projected in our familiar space-time dimension which we know as the material world. The universe is not only self-actuating but also self-determining.
As I continue on my unfinished search I find it pertinent to quote a sanskrit shlok (verse) written 3000 years ago by a Indian monk named Adi Shankracharya.
मनोबुद्ध्यहङ्कार चित्तानि नाहं न च श्रोत्रजिह्वे न च घ्राणनेत्रे । न च व्योम भूमिर्न तेजो न वायुः चिदानन्दरूपः शिवोऽहम् शिवोऽहम् ॥१॥
Translation: Neither am I the Mind, nor Intelligence nor Ego, Neither am I the organs of Hearing (Ears), nor that of Tasting (Tongue), Smelling (Nose) or Seeing (Eyes), Neither am I the Sky (Space), nor the Earth (Matter), Neither the Fire nor the Air, I am the Ever Pure Blissful Consciousness;
I am Shiva, I am Shiva !!!!!!