KARACHI, Nov 16: For the intrepid photojournalist, the world is indeed his/her playground. This was amply illustrated by an impressive display of around 600 press photographs that have been put up at the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture here as part of a three-day international exhibition that was inaugurated on Sunday.

Featuring the work of photojournalists from Japan, India, Iran, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh as well as the length and breadth of Pakistan, the exhibition is part of a two-day seminar on photojournalism that concluded on Sunday and has principally been organized by the Pakistan-Japan Cultural Association.

The exhibition will remain open to the public till Wednesday. Most of the work on display is simply stunning and faithfully translates into a visual format the variegated spectrum that is life.

The lens-men have captured moments of joy and sheer revelry, while there are also moments depicting manifest barbarity, showcasing the viciousness man is capable of inflicting on his own kind.

The sacred and the profane have come together, recorded through the eye of the camera, with the wonders of nature captured in their pristine beauty, along with the marvels man – perhaps the greatest mystery of nature – has built both in honour of himself and to remember his Creator.

Though some purists would argue that conceptual photography falls outside the pale of photojournalism, the lens-men whose work has been displayed here have blurred the lines: the result is an appreciable fusion that celebrates the image for what it is.

Ahmedullah Salemi from Afghanistan captures the extremes that have come to represent his war-torn homeland. There is a shot of people merrily playing about in snow, while in the next few gory shots, the aftermath of what appears to be a bomb blast is depicted, as men, women and children flee for cover.

Massoud Hossaini’s photographs, also taken in Afghanistan, feature a boy standing in a battered synagogue in the city of Heart, while an American soldier is scene cocking his gun amidst a fierce sandstorm somewhere in the province of Helmand.

Mohammad Mohsin from Bangladesh has chosen to display enchanting scenes from Cox’s Bazaar as well as a shot from the dazzling Chittagong Hill Tracts. His compatriot Rafiqur Rehman has captured an impressive image of cycle-rickshaws clogging a street in the Bangladeshi capital of Dhaka as far as the eye can see, while there’s also a shot of scores of fish being dried in Cox’s Bazaar.

Indian lens-man Himanshu Vyas has photographed the late prime minister Benazir Bhutto handing out alms to a smiling beggar in the narrow lanes of Ajmer, the Rajasthani town which hosts the mortal remains of revered Sufi Khawaja Moinuddin Hasan Chishty, during her 2003 visit. He has also shot an amazing image of a Bijnoi woman nursing a fawn along with her own child, while he has captured the desert dwellers of a village near Jaipur, dressed in the gay colours of Rajasthan.

Tashi Tobgyal, also from India, displays the disparity that is part and parcel of the Indian economic ‘miracle’: migrant workers from Bihar take a tea break in Delhi, while in two shots, creatively placed side by side, the feat of the well-heeled are shown at a party, next to an image of the feet belonging to a member of the permanent underclass, tattered and torn.

Colourful scenes from a festive Kurdish wedding form part of Iranian photographer Amir Ali Jawadian’s entry to the exhibition, while Japanese photographer Tsuyoshi Takeda has taken some absolutely breathtaking shots of the towering Himalayas. In perhaps the most stunning shot, a Buddhist monk prays for no more floods underneath a mountain crevice, unaware but not unaffected by the menace of global warming.

Nepali photographer Shruti Shrestha has captured the process of change in her land-locked former Himalayan kingdom: a female Maoist fighter cuddles a comrade’s baby; former king Gyanendra with hands folded in the traditional Nepali manner and a long line of women clad in brightly coloured saris lining up to vote in the elections for the country’s constituent assembly.

Her compatriot Min Ratna Bajracharya has also captured the former king – in better days – riding in what seems to be a horse-drawn carriage, a jewel-encrusted crown on the top of his head. The snapshot of one of the Kumaris, or so-called living child goddesses, being offered fruit and other delights is particularly interesting.

Sri Lankan photographer Buddhika Weerasinghe’s shot of a child somewhere on the teardrop-shaped island with a plastic gun in hand, underneath a Unicef signboard, is quite ironic.

Aside from the international photographers, the work of local lens-men has also been recognized. Saeed Ali Achakzai’s photos document life in the rugged borderlands of Chaman, while Gul Hamad Farooqui’s images feature the colourfully festooned Kalash of Chitral as well as shots from the Lowari Pass. Ghulam Qadir Baloch has featured the port of Gwadar in his work, while there are also entries from the metropolises of Karachi, Lahore and Rawalpindi/Islamabad, aside from the hinterland of the Punjab, Sindh and the NWFP.

There are shots of the city of lights, along with those from Lahore’s Mughal monuments. Lithe models strut down runways next to pictures of malangs in colourful turbans getting stoned out of their minds. Mosques and Sufi shrines are placed next to high-rises. Rallies are being taken out in defence of Al Quds while suspected terrorist Ramzi Bin al-Shibh is shown after his subjugation and arrest from a Defence apartment block. This, and a whole lot more, is Pakistan through the eyes of its photojournalists.