The Living Desert: Photographs of Thar. There is an easy silence in the air. The only interruptions are the murmur of a rising wind or the occasional grunt of a camel or the distant echo of a mother calling out to her child.

Even more striking is the visual silence. Vast expanses of emptiness, clean lines, elegant shapes, and compositions carefully drawn by nature's patient hand. Almost everything is a shade of brownish grey; sand, skies, mud, straw, camels, cattle, pottery, wells and rope.

One of the first things that one notices when entering the Thar desert are the women and their attire. Splashes of vibrant colors against the monotone backdrop. Always dressed as though going to a wedding, they spend the entire day carrying water, cooking, keeping house, and even constructing homes. There is a quiet and understated, almost elusive grace about this land and its people. This book is an attempt to capture that very grace.

This book is the unexpected child of several trips made by a film crew documenting the world of the people of Thar.