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About the Festival

Chobi Mela was conceived in a nation far removed from the established capitals of photography. Bangladeshi photographers did not feature in the classical books on the medium. Images of Bangladesh seen worldwide were images produced largely by white western photographers. There had been no festival of photography in Asia.

Several issues were being tackled. The ignorance about non-western photographic practice (this was true even within Bangladesh, where photographers knew about Ansel Adams and Edward Weston, but were unaware of important work being done in neighbouring countries); the non-recognition of photography as a valid profession and an art form; the limited options that Bangladeshi and regional photographers had to seeing photography. There was another significant but very localised goal. In a nation where the majority of people cannot read or write, photography provided one of the few means through which the average person could be reached.