Yoga Session in Gurugram
Yoga Session in Gurugram
Florian E.J. Lang
January 4, 2017
“Gurugram is a satellite city of Delhi, located around 30 kilometres south of the Indian capital. Until a few years ago, Gurugram was simply a dusty village in the North-Indian grasslands, defined solely by agriculture. When the previously socialist country opened its markets in the 90s, a construction boom set in, and in the space of just a few years Gurugram expanded to metropolitan proportions. Today Gurugram represents the modernisation of the country like almost no other city in India.
When I got a request in 2015 to do a reportage on modern-day India for a corporate magazine, it was immediately clear to me that I would shoot it in Gurugram. I spent several days roaming the city, drifting between metro-stations with names like ‘Vodafone Belvedere’, the futuristic ‘Cyber City’ centre and various shopping malls.
To give me an insight into the everyday life of a modern family, a friend of mine put me in touch with Praneeta and her family. The young woman lives with her husband, son and mother-in-law on the 21st floor of an apartment complex that has its own leisure club.
During a visit one morning, I spotted a group of women doing yoga on the lawn outside the apartment block – among them, wearing her light-blue sari, Praneeta’s mother-in-law Krishna. By this point I had gradually become used to this unexpected contemporary India: its urban life-style, a leisure culture that moves between recreation club and shopping mall, even the cuckoo clock on the wall in Praneeta’s flat – a souvenir from a holiday in Germany’s Black Forest region. Seeing the women doing their early-morning exercises once again highlighted the stark contrasts that make India so unique.”
When I got a request in 2015 to do a reportage on modern-day India for a corporate magazine, it was immediately clear to me that I would shoot it in Gurugram. I spent several days roaming the city, drifting between metro-stations with names like ‘Vodafone Belvedere’, the futuristic ‘Cyber City’ centre and various shopping malls.
To give me an insight into the everyday life of a modern family, a friend of mine put me in touch with Praneeta and her family. The young woman lives with her husband, son and mother-in-law on the 21st floor of an apartment complex that has its own leisure club.
During a visit one morning, I spotted a group of women doing yoga on the lawn outside the apartment block – among them, wearing her light-blue sari, Praneeta’s mother-in-law Krishna. By this point I had gradually become used to this unexpected contemporary India: its urban life-style, a leisure culture that moves between recreation club and shopping mall, even the cuckoo clock on the wall in Praneeta’s flat – a souvenir from a holiday in Germany’s Black Forest region. Seeing the women doing their early-morning exercises once again highlighted the stark contrasts that make India so unique.”
Florian E.J. Lang+-
Born in Fürth, Germany, in 1980, he became fascinated by photography as a child. After studying Cultural and Media Education, he fulfilled his long-cherished dream of travelling over land from Germany to India. This culminated with his first photo project. He has been working as a freelance documentary photographer since 2011; most of his photo projects have been produced in South Asia. Lang returned to Germany at the end of 2022. He works for national and international publications, including Der Spiegel, Die Zeit and Le Monde. More