Pin-Up Artists

We have seen them on paan-stained walls in public spaces. Now they have entered our galleries and auction houses. And while artists like Man...

We have seen them on paan-stained walls in public spaces. Now they have entered our galleries and auction houses. And while artists like Manjit Bawa still make a distinction between 8216;fine8217; art and popular posters, others like Mumbai-based Chintan Upadhyay and Delhi-based Jose P S revel in the simple, bold possibilities of poster art.

A collaboration with spouse and fellow artist Hema Upadhyay has taken Chintan to the larger-than-life billboard. 8216;8216;Even though I critique mass production and popular imagery, I also acknowledge that I8217;m part of it. This dichotomy interests me,8217;8217; says Upadhyay. The works have been featured in the exhibition Parthenogenesis. Curated by Gary Carsly and Liz Ashburn, the exhibition is currently showing at the Ivan Dougherty Gallery on the campus of the Australian University of New South Wales.

The works feature them striking provocative poses, 8216;advertising8217; products like designer jeans, burgers and getaway honeymoons8212;all very tongue-in-cheek. 8216;8216;Besides using pop imagery, our posters take a dig at our hybrid 8216;global8217; lifestyle,8221; says Hema.

Maqbool Fida Husain, as we all know, started off as a billboard artist. And his style often reflects that. Thief of Baghdad, which featured at Pundole Art Gallery in March 2003, is one such instance. Says Husain, 8216;8216;One of my primary concerns is that the works reach out, even to the common man.8217;8217;

Talking of reaching out to the masses, Manjit Bawa8217;s poster for Shekhar Kapoor8217;s Bandit Queen was sold out at Cannes. But the artist still believes, 8216;8216;Poster art has a space of its own but it can8217;t be compared to pure art.8217;8217;

The poster, however, is still a powerful medium. And artists continue to exploit this. Invasion, a recent exhibition held at India Habitat Centre in Delhi, reinforces this view. Artists Josh P S and T K Harindran8212;products of Trivandrum College of Art, used poster art to protest the US attack on Iraq.

8216;8216;Posters are direct and democratic. They don8217;t need gallery space which gives them mass appeal,8217;8217; says Josh P S, who created a poster depicting a termite affected area with large white ants. Over the poster he wrote 8216;White Invaders8217;.

T K Harindran painted small images to resemble a poster. 8216;8216;I had two hands facing each other8212;without thumbs. It refers to the time the East India Company cut off the thumbs of gifted Indian craftsmen in the textile industry,8217;8217; says Harindran.

Story continues below this ad

Sumedh Rajendran, a sculptor, painted the world map over a photograph of two perfume bottles8212;a symbolic representation of US domination. The show is due to travel to different cities.

Back in Mumbai, the National Gallery of Modern Art just brought to a close a great French poster exhibition. 8216;8216;It was in the middle of the 19th century that the modern publicity poster was born in France,8217;8217; says Alain Weill, the curator of the exhibition.

Post-war 1940s and early 8217;50s, posters re-emerged and, 8216;8216;They had to be gay and colourful. Two young poster artists, Raymond Savignac and Bernard Villemot, set the tone,8217;8217; adds Weill. Small wonder that the show was dedicated to Savignac.

The likes of film-maker Riyad Wadia and Neville Tuli of

Story continues below this ad

Mumbai auction house Osian8217;s have also restored what was once considered raddi. By presenting them in curated shows, the hammer did brisk business at auctions, with the Umrao Jaan poster and lobby cards going for as much as Rs 1.47 lakh while Guide went for Rs 94,500.

Delhi-based designer-turned-artist Baba Anand, of Kitsch Kitsch Hota Hai fame, goes further. He 8216;8216;adds value8217;8217; to film posters with sequins and beads. His ongoing show in Mumbai features Ravi Varmaesque poster art dedicated to the Gods.

Meanwhile, Wadia8217;s collection of posters is travelling around India and abroad. 8216;8216;After Mumbai, it8217;s Bangalore. A section travelled to Berlin and Toronto. Australia and New Zealand are next,8221; says Wadia, who8217;s currently working on a book featuring posters of Fearless Nadia, his grand aunt.

In August, look to Nosh, the South Mumbai vegetarian eatery, for a large show. 8216;8216;It8217;s my first exhibition that features posters and other material from the Wadia Archive,8221; says Wadia. Keep us posted?