A deeply personal photobook portrait of a family hotel on the
India/Tibet border
The hotel in this book is both real and metaphorical, an actual
establishment run by Indian photographer Tenzing Dakpa's (born 1985)
parents in Sikkim, Northeast India, and a prism through which he
revisits his family history and place within it.
Dakpa's photos reveal the physical spaces of the hotel, its guest rooms,
dining room, the family's cat on a flight of stairs; as well as signs of
daily working life there: sheets hanging out to dry, clipping plants in
the garden, his parents engaged in various tasks. For the hotel is both
public and private, a business and a home: a transient place for guests
who come and go and a residence that holds the memories of its owners
and projects their hopes.
The Hotel is the winner of the Singapore International Photography
Festival Photobook Award 2018.