Bombay, 2008, between Fountain and Churchgate Possibly 2008 - 2014

In 2008, somewhere in Bombay between Fountain and Churchgate, Leo Rubinfien took this photograph. You can see a small group of men. A candid shot, with a sense of immediacy—the contrast between light and shadow creates a captivating depth. I'm thinking about what it must have been like to be the photographer—framing his subjects, deciding when to press the shutter. Did he feel like he was intruding, or did the men know they were being photographed? It's funny, isn't it? The way someone's gaze can change the entire atmosphere of a picture. The man in the front is wearing glasses and looking straight at us, like, "Yeah, I see you." I think it would be interesting to know if Rubinfien had thought about Cartier-Bresson or Winogrand when he took the image. This picture is part of a long dialogue that extends from the history of photography into the present. And there's no definitive answer.