Upendra has a cigarette dangling from his lips, Rajnikanth is painted in psychedelic colours, Sanjay Dutt looks regal in a trademark leather jacket. Such stickers are everywhere: from the windshields of auto rickshaws to the back of lorries. Though traffic jams are a menace in Bengaluru, at least there is some entertainment catching a glimpse of quirky quotes at the back of vehicles. MetroPlus chatted with auto drivers, interviewed a local artist and traced a first-of-its-kind initiative in Bengaluru to discover the art work and ideas behind bumper stickers.
Raghu ups the volume of a foot-tapping dance number. There are neon lights all over his auto. Everything about his auto screams bling. But what catches your attention is a poster of Rajnikanth. “He’s god for me. God. Thalaiva !” Where did you get the picture? “Oh I cut it out from a magazine and pasted.” When we ask other auto drivers who play it safe with a flowers on their windshields, they inform us: “They’re all done on the computer. Graphics.” But when we go out in search of an artist who hand paints stickers, we are met with blank looks. One shop keeper tells us: “Oh I see! You want old-fashioned sticker. Go towards Jubilee Marriage Hall, and ask for Afsar Pasha. He is a painter.”
Afsar looks up from his work, spectacles perched on the hook of his nose, and asks: “Who told you about me?” We tell him we asked around and finally found his small shop A.S. Arts Planet, in a by-lane in Thimmaiah Road, Shivajinagar. “There is no value for art these days,” he says, when asked if he hand paints stickers. “I used to paint film star stickers and cut-outs on vinyl sheets three or four years earlier. There were customers for them back then. I am still open to making these products if people are interested.” He then opens his computer, which occupies a large space of his unorganised, artistic workspace, and brings out his works of film actors from folders.
There is a retro portrait of Rajnikanth and cut outs of Sanjay Dutt. “I have painted portraits of Shankar Nag, Rajkumar, Dr. Vishnuvardhan , Amitabh Bachchan and Shah Rukh Khan. For these I have used normal paints,” says Afsar. “For car stickers, you need to work with vinyl or radium sheets.” From age eight, he used to accompany his father, who was also an artist, to his work space, and developed his talent for painting. He won a prize at the 2012 Road Safety Through Painting competition. Afsar shows me one among many pictures of Rahul Dravid presenting him the award. Oil paintings of Napoleon Bonaparte, paintings in water colours of portraits, fruits and flowers, and graphic art work for school posters and picture books are among the many treasures in his artistic trove. For over 30 years, Afsar has remained true to his passion. But he says people need to invest more in them. “Computerised art work is more prevalent these days. But hand painting needs skill. There should be more appreciation for art.”
If Afsar's local design and art sense defines his life-like stickers, The Indian Family Sticker (IFS), by Bengaluru-based Cherian Kunnath and Neetu Varma, delves into no-fuss, trendy line diagrams.
IFS has won hearts with their unique stickers. Yes, even though the word unique is overused, it holds true for their products.
Their USP is to capture the eccentricities of the big, Indian family from different regions including Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Kerala.
There are 136 characters, and each has a hilarious description. Take SquareCut Skanda, for example, who has been described thus: “An ardent devotee of his hometown hero Rahul Dravid, Skanda is often seen faking stomach ache for ODIs and viral fever to last the duration of a Test.” Or Tambaram Thangavelu, who is “unapologetically down to earth, he is the kind who considers life an aberration to sleep.”
Speaking about the inspiration behind IFS, Neetu says: “Cherian returned to India after doing his masters degree in automotive design from Deakin University in Melbourne. He decided to take a break to attend his brother’s wedding and settle some other stuff back home before he returned to take up a career in some automotive design firm in Australia. That break extended way beyond his initial plans and he ended up travelling, rather aimlessly, throughout India to places as diverse as Haridwar and Rishikesh in the north to Kolhapur and Goa in the west and crisscrossed through Kerala, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. And through these journeys he would be fascinated by the stickers at the back of cars and trucks. The sheer diversity of the messaging and amount of personalisation was something unique to India.” Back in Bengaluru, Cherian spent hours staring at the backs of the cars in front of his stuck in traffic, hoping for something to brighten up his mood in endless traffic. And that is how IFS came to be.
Designed by Kabini Amin, the attention to detail in the cute black-and-white stick figures makes them fascinating. “Each one of us would have doodled a stick figure at some point in our lives,” says Neetu, adding: “Each character that we design whether they are based on region or interests or profession starts in the same way. We first come up with a name and a detailed sketch of visual traits that should go with each character. Then there is discussion on what to keep and what to highlight for each character. Our customers love the fact that there are so many quirks in our characters that only they would recognise. We stay away from the cultural stereotypes of communities and take the ‘insider view’, for example we would look at how a Malayali sees himself rather than how a north Indian would see a Malayali. This is crucial difference which is not easy to replicate.”
Though the stickers are primarily for cars and bikes, Neetu says: “Our customers seem to come up with new ways to showcase these stickers everyday. We have seen people putting them on laptops, phones, refrigerators and there was a recent family who out it onto a window outside their house.”
For more information visit: www.TheIndianFamily
Sticker.com. For Afsar’s art work, call: 9343491919.
