India, June 6 -- 1You made several visits to Kashmir over five years. How did you decide which moments would best capture the Kashmiri winter, and people's experiences? In general, when I work, I don't look for anything specific at first. Instead of taking buses or taxis, I often walk. While walking, I'd meet people. Many of them would invite me to their home for tea or a meal. People were always kind. It might sound odd but I wanted to photograph with love, when I was in Kashmir. Many of us grew up looking at Western news publications such as Time magazine and The New York Times. There was this clear pattern in the images they published of the Global South, including India, in which this part of the world was almost always shown in a state of perpetual strife. It was common to see photos of people with their arms up in the air mourning or holding arms, and to see images of poverty and malnourishment. What seemed to be missing were images that showed people resilient and in dignity. It had felt like a conscious way to dehumanise a people far away. Once I recognised how the West was looking at us in the Global South, it became impossible to not see the same pattern repeated in Indian media when the focus was on Kashmir or the north-east, or for that matter the Adivasi regions of central India. So, when I started visiting Kashmir, one of the very few things that I was sure about was that I wanted to photograph it with love. 2The book depicts the distinct phases of winter - Chillai Kalan, Khurd, and Bach'e - while weaving in the resilience of people. How did you approach the editing and sequencing of these images? Somewhere along the way, it had become clear to me that the main structure of the book would be the passage of time through the three phases of winter. Over the past few years, we have seen a live-streamed genocide started in Gaza and in Sudan. The world feels brutal. I don't know how I will get over the images of children searching for their parents in the rubble. The way I've edited my book is very influenced by the times we live in. It is less concerned with a photographic language and makes more space for images of people than it might have done if it had been published in 2019. Photographs of parents with children, of comforting gestures between people and of touch, and so on, feel even more important to include today. 3As an artist from outside the region, how did you gain the trust of all these people who let you into their lives? It helped that I had friends who introduced me to people. People seemed to be as curious about me as I was about them. I did not want to parachute in and make work "about Kashmir". I hoped to take a more meandering approach because that would help me discover my relationship with the place, rather than projecting something predetermined onto the landscape....