Ujjayi’s Journey

The individual relationship with the divine is not so much worship but a quest for the liberation. – Anonymous, Wall Writing, Cochin, India

Ujjayi means “victorious breath” in Sanskrit. I explore different cultures around the world through the lens of color. In chance encounters, the extraordinary is made visible in the ordinary—a deity is transformed into a butterfly and a stretched sari becomes a magical orange veil. Hybrids of the abstract and the real, the painterly and the documentary, these works present a reality that is a cross between my imagination and the real world. Ujjayi’s Journey was photographed during five trips to India between 1996 and 2008. My love for India and its diversity, history, culture, humor and religious rituals increased with each visit. The spiritual aspect of Indian culture was of particular interest to me, especially the Mahadevi (Great Goddess), who can manifest herself in multiple forms, and Darshan, the process of worship whereby the devotee views the deity and the deity views the devotee. Ujjayi’s Journey is a visual poem in which I explore religious coexistence, rituals, the female world and nature. I tell the story of my search for the portrayal of the divine-as-feminine within India’s contemporary culture, linking the present to the past. – Maxine Henryson