Mothers & Goddesses: Photobook 'MATAJI' Is A Visual Meditation On The Divine Feminine

Rooted in visions and mystical experiences, the book engages with the Devi Mahatmya, a foundational Hindu text that celebrates the goddess in her many forms.

The title borrows from a term commonly used across Indian households — a respectful invocation that simultaneously denotes 'Mother' and 'Goddess'. For Sagar, there is no division between the two. Sagar Kharecha

Published on:

23 Jul 2025, 11:30 am

3 min read

The divine feminine in Indian cosmology is an ever present entity. This motherly figure is projected on to many aspects of existence like nature and earth. Across Hindu scriptures and traditions, this archetype is invoked through many names like Durga, Kali, Lakshmi, and Parvati. But her essence is singular: generative, cyclical, and enduring. The image of the mother is inseparable from the idea of the goddess. In mythology, she births the universe, is honoured as a nurturer and protector, and is also feared as the destroyer. In daily life, she is folded into every gesture of reverence shown to women.

It is within this devotional terrain that photographer Sagar Kharecha situates his debut photobook, 'MATAJI'. The title borrows from a term commonly used across Indian households — a respectful invocation that simultaneously denotes 'Mother' and 'Goddess'. For Sagar, there is no division between the two. Over five years and across regions as varied as India, England, and Wales, he set out to document the divine as it appears in the world — not only in temples and rituals, but in women he encountered, in his own mother, and in the natural world.

Rooted in visions and mystical experiences, the book engages with the Devi Mahatmya, a foundational Hindu text that celebrates the goddess in her many forms. Structured in three chapters — 'Creation', 'War', and 'Ananda' (bliss) — the book reads like scripture filtered through a personal and perceptual lens.

MATAJI roams the thresholds where the sacred leaks into the mundane. Scattered amidst physical forms of the divine feminine like mothers swaddling children, idols ferried on the backs of trucks, or women immersed in ritual, are abstract images — grainy textures, blurs, and moments where the figure slips from recognition. They turn spiritual states of trance and memory into a reverie of the intangible.

Sagar Kharecha

The photobook's cover designs are hand-drawn directly from visions saturated in symbolism and meaning. The book itself is a nod to the ritualistic practices in India. The Devotional Edition includes Nag Champa incense, an incense holder affixed to the front cover, and a note of thanks written on wildflower seed paper.

Crucially, MATAJI doesn’t reduce the divine feminine to a singular cultural idiom. While rooted in South Asian visuality and ritual, it stretches across geographies and contexts, while asking where goddesses reside in the diaspora, in the margins, and in the natural world. Through a seeker's lens of the world, this project poses a meditation on the question: where do we locate divinity?