Series of 26 photographs with additional texts

 

Hermann Kallenbach and Mohandas Gandhi most likely met for the first time in mid-1903 in Durban. Gandhi was working in South Africa as a lawyer, Kallenbach, originally from northeastern Prussia, was working as an architect. Even though Kallenbach’s lifestyle differed greatly from Gandhi’s ideal (he surrounded himself with expensive amenities and lived quite a consumer lifestyle), he was immediately captivated by him. Under Gandhi’s influence Kallenbach’s lifestyle began to change, and both men gradually grew closer. 

Probably the most intimate and intense stage of their relationship was their approximately year and a half long cohabitation in a house that Kallenbach built for the two of them on the outskirts of Johannesburg. It was inspired by local indigenous architecture, which was why they called it Kraal. Apart from the fact that they shared a household there, Kraal was the place where the idea for the future campaign of passive resistance for the Indian population of South Africa was born, in which Kallenbach played a very important role. Later, they lived together on the edge of Johannesburg at Mountain View, in their own tent, that was where Kallenbach was building his new house. 

It is from this period that their most intimate correspondence dates, one that still raises many questions about their relationship: Your portrait (the only one) stands on my mantelpiece in the room. The mantelpiece is opposite to the bed. The eternal toothpick is here. The corns, cottonwood and vaseline are a constant reminder … If, therefor, I wanted to dismiss you from my thoughts, I could not do it … The point to illustrate is to show you and me how completely you have taken possession of my body. This is slavery with a vegeance. But then the reward, what is it to be? (Gandhi to Kallenbach, CWMG XCVI, p. 20, 24 September 1909)  

Because of Gandhi’s vow of sexual abstinence it is clear that their relationship did not include a sexual element, however, in his study Soulmates Shimon Lev speaks of how there was a strong sexual tension between the two men that was, in consideration of the above stated, homoerotic (in contrast to Erikson, who in the 1960’s came up with the theory of Gandhi’s bisexuality).   
    
In 1910, Kallenbach, already strongly under the influence of Gandhi, bought 1 100 acres of land in Lawly, not far from Johannesburg. Because both men were deeply influenced by Leo Tolstoy’s philosophy they named the farm that they founded after him. This self-sufficient farm served in particular as a refuge for men and women involved in the campaign of passive resistance. It worked on a communal basis up until 1913, when both men finally left it.  

There were sometimes rifts between the two men especially because of Gandhi’s friendships with other people and how busy he was. Kallenbach was often jealous and reproached Gandhi that he gave too much attention to others. At the same time, when Gandhi was away staying with his family in the settlement of Phoenix near Durban, Kallenbach was depressed and lonely. These feelings deepened considerably after Kallenbach returned from his several months long visit with his family in Prussia in 1911, where he had an affair with his underage niece Judith (that Gandhi disapproved of). After his return, Kallenbach lived alternately at his homes in Mountain View and on Tolstoy Farm, where his feelings of frustration and loneliness deepened. 

After the success of the third wave of passive resistance in which Kallenbach played a crucial role, Gandhi decided to satisfy the request of his political guru G. K. Gokhale and return to India and continue his fight for human rights there. It was clear that Hermann Kallenbach would accompany him. However, fate intervened, and because this trip was taking place in 1914 at the beginning of the First World War, Kallenbach was arrested while travelling from India to Britain (because he was German) and interred at a detention facility on the Isle of Man as an enemy of the United Kingdom. Both men assumed it was a misunderstanding, and that Gandhi thanks to his influence would be able to have Kallenbach released quickly. And so Gandhi travelled on to India alone, Kallenbach was supposed to have followed presently. However, Kallenbach was finally released from prison after two and a half years later, in 1917.   

During this time both men continued to maintain a robust correspondence in which Gandhi described to his friend much everyday information about the ashram that he founded in India. At the same time there was escalating tension again as Kallenbach began to feel abandoned and became jealous. Kallenbach accused Gandhi several times of not doing enough for his release. It is a strange and still unexplained fact that Kallenbach did not inform Gandhi when he was finally released. It seems likely that he was bitter and felt cheated. That would also explain why he did not follow Gandhi to India in June of 1920, when after travelling to Europe he returned to South Africa. The two men met once again in 1937 in India. 

Their relationship never again returned to its intimate character. Herman Kallenbach died lonely and bitter in May 1945 in South Africa; his remains are buried in Haifa, Israel. Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated in January 1948 during an evening stroll in Delhi. 

 

About the nature and origin of the photographs

Much is known about the intimate relationship between Hermann Kallenbach and Mahatma Gandhi because of the remaining letters. However, only one side of the correspondence was preserved: Gandhi destroyed Kallenbach’s letters to him. Because, as Gandhi wrote in one of his own notes, Kallenbach would certainly not want anyone reading those kinds of letters.

During the time of their most intimate correspondence they used a very specific way of addressing each other, Gandhi signed his letters as “Upper House,” Kallenbach as “Lower House.” This must have been a reference to the differing functions of the upper and lower chambers of British Parliament.

Of Hermann Kallenbach’s letters to Gandhi, a bare minimum remain. Until now, the existence of the photographs Hermann Kallenbach made for Gandhi from the years 1908 to 1914 has not been well known. He apparently sent them separately from his letters. They contain both stories about everyday events (for example work on the farm, events surrounding the campaign of passive resistance, photographs of visitors who came to their Mountain View residence, etc.), and also ones that reflect his feelings, fears, and personal insecurities. 

To this day it is not clear, given Gandhi’s negative views on the achievements of modern society, how Hermann Kallenbach was able to take these photographs. From one of the diary entries it is clear that Kallenbach made his own pinhole camera (in the form of camera obscura), photographs from that he likely developed himself in the field on strong paper. From the variation in the quality of the photographs it can be presumed that some of them were taken on a better quality instrument. So therefore it remains a question whether he borrowed a camera or hired a photographer. It is also unclear why Gandhi, who destroyed the letters, did not destroy the photographs as well. Or why the photographs did not stay in Gandhi’s estate. Why did he leave them in South Africa (from where they were taken to Europe by German voyager Gerhard Venzke, whose family later sold them to the Swiss Signer family, who kept them into their private collection)? We will likely never know the answer. However, Kallenbach’s photographs are one of the missing fragments that can help us understand the relationship between the two men. What is more, each photograph has a brief note on the back, that either relates to Kallenbach’s feelings at the time, or relates to the current events.

For many decades these photographs lay in a private family collection without any public knowledge of their existence. The Signer family has let them be available for their first public exposition in Johannesburg – where they originated.