Unlike Poland, our history doesn’t have much to boast in terms of posters. Always on the fringes, it has been a part of our popular culture, primarily associated with films and commercial goods.
But a creative mind doesn’t fall in the trappings of boundaries. Arpana Caur, Harinder Singh, Pradeep Aeri and Suddhasatwa Basu found a calling in posters for their latest outing and are exhibiting their posters on environment at Arpana Caur’s gallery, Academy of Fine Arts and Literature in Siri Fort Institutional Area.
Even in such times when other robust forms of communication are spreading message — social media, especially, is so easily accessible — the artists don’t undermine the power of posters.
“We consciously chose the form of posters because, firstly, every time my work travels, my heart skips a beat. The idea is to communicate and spread a message regarding our ecology so it should travel,” says Arpana recalling coming away smitten from the world’s only poster museum in Poland 20 years ago. The strength of these posters is that the imagery and text, while asserting their distinct identity, do integrate well.
Twenty posters 30x40 inches each are rendered digitally, some even in watercolours. Arpana makes a comment on the depleting population of sparrows in her work by playing on the nursery rhyme of “9.8.2.4 sparrows are no more”. Harinder Singh depicts a screwdriver inserted into a globe.
The group comprises senior artists with varied backgrounds. While Arpana is a painter, Harinder is a graphic designer and cartoonist. Suddhasatwa has directed and animated the first animation tele-serial of the country, Gayab Aya .He is a visiting faculty at College of Art, New Delhi, and Aeri, a graphic designer, heads a design studio ‘Design Edge’ in Delhi.
To start with, school groups are being invited to view the exhibition.
(The exhibition is on till January 2.)
