A new exhibition in the UK explores the lives of South Asian immigrants in 1950s Coventry through the work of India-born photographer “Masterji”. Maganbhai Patel, popularly known as “Masterji”, spent years documenting the lives of South Asian immigrants in Coventry in the West Midlands in England. He was a well-known figure in the community and is considered to be the city’s first Indian photographer. Now an exhibition, titled “Through the Lens of Masterji”, at Compton Verney Art Gallery in Warwickshire, is looking back at his life and his work that inspired a generation of Indian immigrants. “I remember my mother telling me that people actually used to get my dad to go down to the hospitals and have their photographs taken in the hospital with their first-born child,” says his daughter Tarla Patel.
Patel was born on 1 January 1924 in Dedvasan, a small village in Surat in the western state of Gujarat in India. He studied there and went on to become a headmaster at a local school. But he had bigger dreams and ambitions. When he heard how well his friends who had migrated to England were doing, he decided to follow them and try his luck too.
His journey to England began from the port of Mumbai where he boarded a steamer cabin ship called the Jaljawahar with his small brown metal case. Inside this, he carried his prized possession – a black and white photograph of his mother which was tucked away with his other belongings. It took him around 21 days to reach his destination and in January 1951, he finally arrived in England.
For a lot of migrants coming into post-war Britain, the jobs available were often manual. Patel managed to get work as a factory worker at the General Electric Company (GEC) in Coventry. He settled down quickly, made friends with the people around him and soon joined GEC’s photographic society. His love for photography had begun back in India where he would frequently borrow his friend’s camera and take photos of his surroundings. Having regular work at the GEC allowed him to save up and buy a Kodak Box Brownie camera.
It wasn’t long before his friends started to approach him for their photos so that they could send them back to their families in India. Patel’s friends affectionately called him “Master” in reference to his former job in India. As the years went by, this became “Masterji” (Ji is often used as a suffix after names in India to show respect).
At first, he would take black and white photographs of mostly single men who had come to Coventry to earn a wage and return home. Slowly these men started settling down in the city and later brought their families or their new bride to England. Masterji found himself taking more and more photos of men with their families. In the early days, he would take these photos at his home. As he became popular, people started hiring him for weddings, birthdays, and other private events. Very soon, through word of mouth, the demand for Masterji’s services increased and he quit his factory job to focus on photography full time. In 1969, he opened the Master’s Art Studio. He lived with his family above the studio.
During busy periods, his wife and children would drop in to help him. Ms Patel recalls this as a “wonderful” time. She grew up seeing a busy studio with many different people as customers. “You could hear various accents,” she said. “We used to help with the albums. As I got older, I used to help take photographs in the studio or help out with wedding photographs,” she adds.
Today, Master’s Art Studio is run and managed by Ms Patel’s elder brother Ravindra Patel. Masterji’s wife Ramaben Patel played an important role in the success of his work and studio. She was instrumental in developing many of the photos and interacting with customers. Masterji’s work acts like a socio-historic record of immigrants who came and settled in the city and helped build it.
His images document not just the changes in the lives of the immigrant community but also in the medium of photography. As colour photography arrived, his portraits began capturing a new generation of British-born children of Indian parents in the city. Masterji died in 2018 but Ms Patel and her family hope that the exhibition can help pass on their father’s memories and legacy to future generations.
