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BETWEEN, STILL
A journal for sustained looking
Photo Essay

Morning in the Home Garden

As his children grow up in the landscape where he was raised, Indrajit Khambe finds himself returning to an earlier self — one formed by solitude, nature, and a childhood that was never photographed.

Photographs and text by Indrajit Khambe — March 30, 2026

In Morning in the Home Garden, Indrajit Khambe photographs his children in the rivers, trees, and open landscape of Sindhudurg, the region where he himself grew up. Watching them move through this familiar world, he encounters his own childhood again — not as something distant or complete, but as a living presence carried forward through place, gesture, and daily life.

Because no photographs remain from his own early years, these pictures hold a particular weight: they preserve not only his children’s fleeting seasons of wonder and freedom, but also a past he can revisit only through memory. The result is a quiet, deeply felt essay on inheritance, tenderness, and the enduring bond between childhood and home.

A tree standing in water alongside a child’s splash in the river.
A child moving through the landscape, with an arm raised toward the sky.
A child seen through glass beside another child resting indoors.
A child floating in water next to feet balanced at the river’s edge.
A child immersed in shimmering water.
“Spending time with them is akin to reliving my childhood.”
A close view of a child’s shoulders and back emerging from water.
Children in domestic spaces, resting and playing in afternoon light.
A child drawing and playing inside the home.
A child’s tearful eye beside gathering storm clouds.
“The river, the mountain, the fruits — all familiar touchstones from my youth — are now shared experiences with my kids.”
A quiet expanse of water and distant hills beneath a changing sky.
Hands gathering flowers beside a still riverbank.
A child’s wet head and back rendered as elemental forms.
A child in water and a body submerged among rocks.
Artist

Indrajit Khambe is a photographer based in Sindhudurg, Maharashtra. His work draws from family life, memory, and the natural landscape of the region where he was raised. In his ongoing project Morning in the Home Garden, he photographs his children as they grow up within the same rivers, forests, and open terrain that shaped his own childhood, creating images that reflect on inheritance, intimacy, and the enduring presence of place.

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