Bharat Sikka’s “The Sapper” is as layered and multifaceted as the relationship it narrates, that between a father and an adult son; throughout the sequence, Sikka creates moments of observation, recollection, close confrontation and collaborative performance.
The complexity of the work is emphasised by the title: “the sapper” is both a clue to the father’s life, spent largely within the Indian army, and a formula that allows the author to distance himself from the subject, as if the book was the study of a stranger and not of a well-known and, at least on the surface, familiar figure.
The entire sequence hinges on the contrast between what is known and what is unknown, using the limits of the photographic medium to highlight the impossibility of knowing in depth an apparently simple and physiological reality such as that of a father’s relationship with his son; the project refers to the idea of photography as an act of intrinsic scrutiny, of detailed and in-depth exploration of a real and complex subject.
