Graphic chronicles

The Psychic Plumber and Other Lies — his first major show in Mumbai in three years — took off on Saturday evening and will be on the entire month. The show has 15 panels of graphic art — each containing speech bubbles and Banerjee’s tongue-in-cheek observations on display at Blue Frog’s sound studio. At the bottom of each panel is a tiny iPod which is stuck with earphones. While admiring an art work,a visitor can put on the earphones to enjoy the corresponding musical compositions by composer Ashutosh Phatak. “I have always fantasised about collaboration like this,” Banerjee says. Resonating with the theme of the exhibition,Phatak’s music is inspired by trends from the era. “Eventually,I want the album to stand by itself,” says the Mumbai-based musician.

The first panel,The Psychic Plumber,has plumber Girish rushing to a flooded building to detect a leak. In the absence of a plumbing blue-print,he uses blue dye to detect it. By the time the narration comes to an end,the old building has been pulled down to construct a lavish one. “A scaled-down Taj but it still didn’t have a plumber’s blueprint,” he says. The graphic art combines Banerjee’s sharp observations and social commentary.

In Detective Sharad,the eponymous character is seen cracking his whip on society,but not before eating a quick chicken roll drowned in ketchup. Panty shows experimentations with casual sex and playing out of fantasies. Daily Levitation focuses on the unemployment plaguing most youngsters in the ’70s. Some of the scenes,however,can easily belong to any era. Seven Madrasis has seven old men in identical caps,heading for a holiday together to fulfil a dream they had in college. Churning has a man carrying out his daily ritual of retching. Only Vimal shows the tradition of taking cut pieces to stitch suits.

The largest panels,of course,are dedicated to documenting the consumerism and middle-class aspirations — something that has changed in the post-liberalisation era. In fact,this was the starting point of the exhibition. “Locked in these consumer products is our history,” says Banerjee. However,the graphic artist didn’t want to limit the exhibition to that. Gradually emerged the idea of collaborating with Phatak. Reason: The experience of engaging the auditory system,while looking at the still images can be akin to “watching television on pause,” he says.

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