VISUAL DISPATCH, VOLUME 16

Image: Courtesy of Sunil Gupta & Hales Gallery

Your body of work "Exiles" was created over 40 years ago, yet it still resonates powerfully today. How do you think the meaning of exile has evolved since then?

Sunil: Well, let's start with my own experience. I moved to Canada in the late 60s, where I discovered gay liberation in university. It provided me with an identity that was much more useful than being from India, which at that point was kind of meaningless—nobody had really heard of it or could place it on a map.

When I began returning to India in the early 80s to shoot social documentary projects, I was curious about what gay life would be like there. What I found was that people would say they were gay, but they didn't look like the gay people I knew back in Canada or London. They just had sex with other men occasionally, but everybody seemed to be married or living at home. Nobody was willing to come out or move out—it definitely wasn't possible to live with a same-sex partner. I thought there was some misunderstanding happening. The gay people there seemed very part-time.

On the other hand, people who seemed more like me were finding it impossible to exist in this atmosphere of invisibility. So I began to feel like you either went into exile—literally by leaving the country, or if you stayed, then into a kind of deep underground where you couldn't be found out. The worst thing was to be found out. It was the complete opposite of coming out.

What are your thoughts on how India as a society views sexuality now versus when you were making this work?

Sunil: I moved back to India in 2000, and in 2004 I had a show. The response was generally positive, which provoked me into thinking I might try living there again. I met a group of young queer activists who had started using media like videos and performance to raise queer issues, first in class, then moving into the city with monthly events.

Unlike my generation, this new generation had been born after India liberalized economically in the 90s. They wanted change, and they wanted it now. The first thing they wanted to change was the law—India still had anti-sodomy laws from the British days. This all culminated in positive change when gay sex was legalized. Once they were legal, it was like a floodgate opened. People felt able to come out.

If you have 4000 years of something, and then suddenly in a decade it all changed—my life got transformed over there. There were gay nights to go to, the Internet came, Grindr came.

Can you talk about the process of combining the visual portraits with text?

Sunil: The text came at the same time as the pictures, but not from the same people. Some days I'd go out with a tape recorder, not the camera, to cruising sites and pick up people. I'd say, "We're not going to have sex, we're going to have a chat." That wasn't popular—people would get really pissed off—but some people did speak. Those tapes are the source of the text.

It's important that the text and pictures go together. When people buy the work commercially, they're very interested in the print but not the text. What I should have said from the beginning is that you must show them together, because the combination is what makes the work complete.

At Frieze, we saw people from all backgrounds engaging deeply with your work. What conversations are you hoping to spark?

Sunil: I want to help people become aware that we only enjoy the freedoms we have because laws changed in certain places—and as we're watching in the US, those very same laws can be overturned. You can be back at square one. I think one should stay vigilant wherever we are. It seems like everything's cool, but it's not necessarily as permanent as you think. It just takes a change in government.

What's next for you?

Sunil: The next big show will be at Kettle's Yard at Cambridge University next year, which will be another retrospective. There may be a big book as well.

Note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

Sunil Gupta's work continues to challenge perceptions and advocate for visibility in the LGBTQIA+ community. His photographs serve as both historical documentation and urgent contemporary commentary on the fragility of hard-won freedoms.