The Indian Cartoon Gallery is known for promoting talented cartoonists from across India. This month, the gallery has on display for the first time comic installations by renowned cartoonist Jayaram Udupa. On view are his stupendous caricatures of politicians and famous personalities. His sketches have been published in leading dailies and magazines of the state. He is the first cartoonist to have sketched caricatures of all Karnataka's chief ministers. His cartoons have won him national and international awards.
Udupa is an engineer by profession, and a self-taught cartoonist. He hails from Balkur, a small village in Kundapur of Udupi district. He started his career as a freelance cartoonist in Bangalore. “Time and Again” his collection of cartoons and comic installations explore the duality existing in man and nature: good and bad, life and death, war and peace. Among his comic installations are “(e)nabled” and “recycled”. “Jayaram has combined his engineering and cartooning skills to create these comic installations,” says V.G. Narendra, managing trustee of Indian Institute of Cartoonists.One sketch that stands out is “laughter is the best medicine”. It is a human skull that on a closer look appears to be laughing. “In life, man is so weighed down by worries and cares that he finds no time to laugh and enjoy life. This cartoon portrays that after death, man finally laughs,” explains V.G. Narendra.
The exhibition is interspersed with light-hearted cartoons such as the “Leaning world of Pisa”, a soft-self caricature titled “The balancing act”, a sketch of Earth and Mars connected by a rope with two astronauts walking the tight rope etc.
Udupa has also addressed environmental issues in his cartoons. Water dripping into a piggy bank suggests the importance of conserving water.
Udupa sketched caricatures impromptu directly on a computerised, professional drawing device which supports all applications.
The device weighs 1.8 kgs and it comes with a stylish pen that has an electro-magnetic resonance and is shock-proof. The device has been developed by Japan and is being made available by Cintiq in India too.
V.G. Narendra hopes to provide a platform for aspiring cartoonists from India. “Time and Again” is on display at the Indian Cartoon Gallery till September 18 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 1, Midford Garden, behind Big Kids Kemp, off M.G. Road, Bangalore-560001. Call 9980091428.
