Gurgaon: The city has officially called itself host to the world’s largest camera
museum since 2016 after the municipal corporation promised to build one and announced a collaboration with photographer-curator
Aditya Arya on
World Photography Day that year.
Two years later, there is no museum yet.
On Thursday, the
MCG slapped of heavy penalty of Rs 45 lakh on the contractor for the ambitious ‘Museo
Camera - Centre of Photography’ after finding that only 10% of work on the project, which was to be completed by November this year, has been done.
The tender to build the 15,000 square feet museum in
Chakkarpur village was allotted in November last year. According to the executive engineer of the municipal corporation, who wrote to the contractor (TOI has a copy of the letter), the museum will not be completed on schedule at the current pace of work.
“…it is intimated to you that more than 40% of the time period has already lapsed. But the progress of the work is very slow… two notices have been issued to you under reference and that you were requested to speed up the work but till date only 10% work has been completed,” the letter reads.
Arya, founder of the city’s Vintage Camera Museum that he runs from his the basement of his house, said he was “glad that MCG has taken note of it”. “I’ve been telling them for while about the delay. Contractors are supposed to be answerable to the people at large,” he said.
Arya has around 700 models of cameras of all shapes, sizes and vintages. The camera museum was announced by former MCG joint commissioner Vivek Kalia, who saw Arya’s collection and promised to build a repository that is world-class and a centre of excellence.
The camera museum has been envisaged as a place for all photography enthusiasts, from seasoned professionals to amateurs to the only curious. It will also be a place where schools can bring kids on tours as well as hold its own classes and workshops to spread knowledge about photography.
Arya has acquired between 700 and 800 original patents of cameras made between 1880 and 1890. These patents, displayed in big prints, he has archived. Arya is also the owner of a collection of ads, fascinating in that they allow you a glance into how photography was advertised in the past. Museo Camera is supposed to host all these collections.
The museum will also detail, chronologically, how photography developed, from the time of the pinhole and the camera obscura, through to daguerreotypes and dry plates, and on to Kodak (and the birth of film), the Polaroid and digicam.
