From Delhi to New York, from the street to the bath house, he has captured clandestine moments, risked his freedom \u2013 and even referenced Romantic painters. Ahead of a major show, the photographer relives his landmark shots<\/p>\n
\u2018I\u2019ve been very promiscuous,\u201d Sunil Gupta says, reflecting on his experiments with photography since the 1970s. Gupta, who was born in India, brought up in Canada and moved to the UK in 1978 after two years studying in New York, has documented and described queer lives for five decades. In his work, he\u2019s quietly tried to find new ways of seeing, exploring the potential of photography to blur fiction and reality, public space and intimate, clandestine moments. His work explores the ways we love and relate to one another, set against the ever-shifting tides of politics and society.<\/p>\n
He photographs with love \u2013 but it hasn\u2019t been without risk. An exhibition in India was once shut down by the government, and in his early days in the UK, when he was working with fellow photographer Tessa Boffin, he recalls curators \u201cphysically shrinking away when we walked in the room \u2013 two queers in leather were too much for them! But we were quite aggressively upfront with our sexualities, we weren\u2019t shy about it.\u201d<\/p>\n
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