Magnificent Mario

While compiling Miranda’s sketches,illustrations and cartoons,Goa became a natural subject for da Cunha. So did Mumbai. Miranda has drawn these two places extensively — he brings out the quirkiness of life,humour and charm that are quintessential to both coastal cities. “Mario’s work on ‘Bombay’,belonging to the 1950-70s period,is very fascinating. His understanding of the city is very different from his other work. A number of them talk about his bus travels and the interesting characters he encountered during them,” he says. Publishing books,however,is something de Cunha accidentally got into. When nobody was ready to publish his Houses of Goa in 2000,he brought it out under Architecture Autonomous. Since then,the company has published eight more books.

In the latest collection,the publisher has also incorporated some pages of Miranda’s diaries. “Most of these diaries belonged to the period when Mario was 19-20 years old and he was not ready to come out with it,” says da Cunha,who had to convince the artist to give his approval. Travels,another special book in the series,contains his illustrations of Germany,Spain,Paris,New York,England,Macau,Jerusalem and Yugoslavia. “Mario is an important artist and documenter of our times. The world needs to be aware of his work and appreciate it,” says the architect,who has designed Nityagram.