another subcontinent is proud to present "travels on an elepHAND: prints by manjula padmanabhan". this feature is now live on our home site. we invite your thoughts and feedback on it here. manjula (magnolia) will participate in the discussion as well.

Beautiful!!! I liked the 3rd gallery especially the bull and the seasons.

This post has been edited by Jai Malhar: Mar 22 2005, 11:01 PM

Manjula, i have always liked you and your work, and am honored to have got an insight into this collection. I will be by again to tell you which ones I really love.

Rushina

happy day love your work and am thrilled to bits to see it here!

Hola, Jai, Rushina -- this is totally thrilling. I normally do NOT enjoy opening day of a show because it means a whole day of feeling like a pressure cooker at bursting point -- followed by a sense of deflation once the painting's are up and people are looking at the work with blank expressions (it's not their fault -- my expression's blank too, on the rare occasions I go to a show -- but it's part of what's excruciating about having a show -- wanting to be impassive, but not succeeding).
But thanks to Arnab, this show's been entirely painless! Even though it took me a several weeks to get around to sending my stuff to Arnab in the first place. He has been mega-patient.

Thanks for stopping by.

Manjula,

I found the "schoolgirls" really fascinating- it seems to show the regimentation behind the apparently simple facade of schooling. Reminded me of Pink Floyd's "brick in the wall" metaphor, what with the focus on bricks to the extent it is there and also the scary glass pieces on top of the wall.

Am I reading too much into it?

I also loved your pieces on the seasons-- especially "autumn". The textures look great and I wish I could see the prints themselves.

Anjali

Do some of them have a Japanese feel to them, with regard to the compositions? Or is it just my obsessions showing through? I also loved the La Chanteuse.

Thanks Anjali, thanks gingerly -- I'm glad to be here.

Jai -- it's interesting that you see a Japanese influence -- it's not something I have gone towards consciously -- maybe something to do with the spare textures? And perhaps just PRINT textures, because they've produced such outstanding work. These prints really do not represent tremendous technical virtuosity -- I am not being modest here, it's merely a statement about technique, like saying I've used a box-camera and NOT a Nikon to take photographs -- whereas the Japanese prints I've seen are absolutely amazing for technique -- multi-coloured, multi-layered, astoundingly complex. So in that sense, I don't see a Japanese influence except just a teeny bit in BULL and MAGNOLIA -- even so, it wasn't conscious. The back-reference for Mag was that at the time I was exploring my Inner Lioness ... hence the name I gave the lady, once she was drawn (alas, I look nothing like her, so she ISN'T me. Just my wannabe).

I think of these drawings as sort of extensions of my illustrations -- but because they're NOT illustrations -- i.e., they've NOT been built around an existing text that I've been commissioned to illustrate -- they have a stand-alone quality, as if each one were telling its own story. Or anyway, that's how I think of them. Anjali, for that reason, I certainly DON'T think you're reading too much into "Schoolgirls"! The thing about a semi-realistic drawing is that the details are entered consciously -- I remember putting in the glass along the top of the wall because that's what you DO see along the tops of walled properties here! And I've always thought it looked cruel -- cruel by intent -- as if anticipating the poor torn hands that might result from someone trying to climb up -- and then perhaps also suggesting the ladder that might so easily be used to circumvent the glass ...

I see what you mean about the glass pieces. And I remember seeing them when I grew up in Pune too. But what I admire here is the bringing together of these realistic bits to make a metaphorical statement. The combination of the hard stone wall, with the bricks that do not allow for any peep of light through them, and then this topped off by the glass pieces, this seems ominous-- and then the contrast with the innocent girls. But even there the way they file in straight lines, with even their uniforms really "uniform" ( -- that's me being articulate!)- it just seemed to tell a fascinating story.

By the way, I was recently introduced to the illustrations of Henry Darger-- and he has absolutely marvellous sets of illustrations that have this stand-alone quality you talk about. He too features young kids -- and through his illustrations he makes some disturbing statements about their role in our society.

Anjali

Ah Marge.

At last i get to visit one of your exhibitions. Here's to more of them in this city without boundaries we all share.

p

Wonderful! I especially love the witty hands, the poignancy of the girls & the chai boy, the repetition of decorative elements in the carpet folks and grasses (& I see what JM means about the Japanese connection, where I also see similarity of gesture).

Thank you so much for showing us your work!

cj

manjula,

i think you might have explained to me over email why there is no "winter" in the seasons series, but my ram is full and new files are being randomly deleted (in my brain that is). also, i'm sure other people are wondering as well.

i'd like to ask a little about the sizes of these pieces. it struck me some time after i actually coded the site that some of these might actually be appearing larger on my screen than they are in real life! especially the 3x5 inch pieces. can i ask a little about how you decide on what scale a given piece will be actualized?

thanks again for letting us all see your work.

arnab

Hola Zig! Kewl griffin. Always DID like dem tings, even before H. Potter showed us his new age version of em. I prefer the classic iron'n'claws variety -- like yours. SeaJay, thanks and maybe the Japanese element comes to me through the channel of Art Nouveau because in the early years my illustrations were strongly influenced by that style -- and of course, European artists of that school got THEIR inspiration from Japanese wood cuts, which had lately become very popular. So ... through a roundabout channel ... Japanese influence in my work! Inneresting.

Arnab, here's what I wrote to you re the lack of WINTER: ... there's no WINTER coz (following the logic of ever-increasing cloth) there'd be nothing to see -- the analogy being of course with mortality -- i.e., cloth equals time/matter/material goods. Alas, since cutting the CD, I no longer have full sets. Unless I'm mistaken, there are no "SUMMER"s left --

-- and uh-oh, that reminds me, I need to go in there and check up on which of the prints still are available. In general, all the older ones are coming to the ends of their editions -- meaning, most of the 3"x5"s and all the monochrome long ones.

Sizes: I'm not sure whether your question is about the scanned images of the prints or whether you want to know what determines my choice of the physical sizes of the prints -- I'm assuming you're asking the former question, i.e., how I decided the scan-sizes. All except the pix that were too large to fit on the scanner (HYBRID, for instance) were scanned at 150 dpi resolution, after which I didn't re-size them. With the long prints, I needed to scan them twice and then splice the two images together because the full length wouldn't fit (yes, the IMAGE would, but not the paper surround -- and I felt it was important to see the actual edges of the printing sheet).

I've not seen these images in browser windows other than on my computer, so I don't know to what extent colours, shades, etc have become exaggerated. I did attempt to smooth out extremes of variation at the edges of the splice, but it's possible that they're more pronounced on some machines?? Dunno, tell me. The larger images were photographed on a digital camera and the image flattened/contrast heightened, to compensate for the loss of resolution from scanning to photograph.

It's certainly true that the result is misleadingly magnified esp. with the 3"x5"pix -- it's like those extreme close-ups of models' faces on the covers of glamour magazines -- but unlike glamour mags, there's been no air-brushing of blemishes here. I thought it was kind of worthwhile to leave the images big, so that you could see them with all their little scratches and bruises. In real life, they're smaller, and a bit smoother. Of course, each one varies very slightly (despite being edition prints, which are supposed to be identical) from others in its edition.

I continue to enjoy the tremendous rewards of printing versus one-off originals because it has allowed me to share a single image with several people at once. I just LOVE that. I think the habit of being in print -- through the newspapers, magazines and publishing houses I used to work for as an illustrator -- has left me with a weakness for the multiple-originals concept: one drawing, many owners.

Hi Manjula,

Thank you for putting up this exhibition, it was pure delight to view it!

Loved your style, your humour, the Ladies Lunch was hilarious and beautiful! And your textures are gorgeous, the grass collection was beautiful, the hair, lines, etc, collection was also beautiful. Loved all of them actually, some in particular are so beautiful I want to keep looking at them! Someone mentioned a Japanese influence, I definitely felt that too as I was going through them, very strongly, in the tilt of the head, the composition of the picture, esp of La Chanteuse.

I think whimsical is the right word - captures the mood of the collection so well.

Many congratulations, thank you for all the artistic pleasure you afford others, and really hope to see even more in the future.

Warmly,
Lisa.

Gotta love the elephand, my wallpaper for now.

Like Anjali, I straightaway saw elements of "The Wall" in the schoolgirls image too. But it also reminds me of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, for some reason. And the animal procession from the Jungle Book cartoon.

actually i was asking about the latter--though your answer about the former (which i hadn't had wit enough to ask about) is very interesting too. but scanned size aside what makes you work almost in "miniature" on prints? and how typical are these sizes for your work in general?

i am disappointed to hear about the seasons collection being out of print--that, by the way, is a set that i would think would also look very striking in a larger size. i'm thinking a large cream colored wall with 12x44 inch versions of these side by side...or do you think a large part of the effect of these and the other prints comes from the intimacy of the smaller size?

seem to see the japanese influence too and some gentle decadent perhaps?!i think it was the art noveau influences that particularly caught my fancy early on.especially since i hadn't really seen it in an indian context(not discovered the bengal school!)l

Thanks armagod, thanks dggOlel (there IS a reason for that spelling, right? Or do you share your keyboard with your web-savvy kitty?). I guess I must be more Japanese than I know! Pink Floyd's The Wall ... well ... at the time I made the drawing (i.e., prepared the plate for acid-etching), I felt bricks would be good for background texture -- I know that from prior experience. Certain kinds of repeating motifs, such as bricks in a wall just lend themselves to illustrations because they are so easy to recognize and lend an element of detail without actually being difficult to do (parallel horizontal lines and short vertical strokes between 'em). Basket weaving is another such detail -- looks great, and very easy to create. All it takes is a little time. It's very likely that I was thinking of The Wall at the time I made those bricks but closer to hand were/are all the property walls surround buildings on Delhi's tree-lined avenues.

Arnab -- ah, okay, physical size. Easy one, that! MOST etchings, engravings and other hand-processed forms of printing are small because ... (roll of drums) ... the presses on which this kind of printing is done, typically, are small. It makes sense all around: the plates are expensive (zinc in the case of my prints -- but in the US copperplate is common -- the results are generally finer, but the processing also takes longer) and the effort of inking the plate between each impression is that much more arduous when the plate is larger than (say) an A4 sheet. I realize that it's hard to believe that the plate REALLY IS cleaned and re-inked physically, by hand, for EVERY impression -- but that's part of the charm of this kind of print-making: it IS time-consuming, technically challenging and tedious (in the case of edition-prints) -- and in that sense quite different to impressions created photomechanically, in the thousands. When the size of the plate goes up, so do all the other costs -- in particular paper. The paper used for print-making is really expensive -- and the time/space required to dry the prints increases as well -- studios are generally used on a per-hour basis -- it all begins to add up.

Like I said somewhere back there, I don't make the editions myself -- I am NOT a print-maker, but an artist who happened to choose print-making as a medium -- so I make the plates and over-see the printing, but I don't have the skill to print an edition. I'd love to ... but that'd mean taking time out, at the very least six months of basic training to get up to speed. At this moment, I don't see myself going that route.

Finally, the aesthetics ... ummm ... I think the size of an art-work is part of its statement. There's an intimacy built into the small size of the typical etching -- they're assumed to be small and detailed (though of course there are examples of large works). When I ask myself what SEASONS would've been like if blown up large well ... I rather doubt I'd have repeated that cloth-detail three times over in a large size. I'd have worked it out of my system with just the one!

manjula,

thanks for the detailed answer. yes, i can see how the effect of something like the seasons pieces would be very different on a larger scale. and it is also very interesting to get some insight into the print-making process. those of us who know little about these things--well, me at any rate--don't really understand the degree to which the choice of medium is part of the work of art. ranbir talked about this a little in the discussion of his work as well (which was our first ever feature on another subcontinent).

arnab

everyone else: there is now a picture of manjula on the site.

I am not an art person. However, looking at Elephand, I am tempted to extend the (roughly) horizontal line connecting Leg 1 and Leg 2 to all the way to Leg 3, so that Leg 2 (the one with the ring) becomes the elephant's hind right leg. Of course, the heel of that leg should shift to the right too, supporting the elephant's weight. As drawn, does the elephant have a hind right leg?

VC

Interesting question! No-one's ever asked me that before ... Okay, here's how I see it: (a) yes, there's a right back leg -- and I would say it's the pinky finger, right next to the "tail". But ( it CAN'T be joined to the right front leg (= the middle finger) without sacrificing the integrity of the hand! As it is, the shape of the elephant is so immediately recognizable, it all but overwhelms the hand -- if not for the anomaly regarding the arrangement of the "legs". In order for the drawing to work as a not-this-not-that image, it's got to make you stop and say ... Wait! What's wrong with that elephant's legs? Then you see the hand. Does that help?

: the shape of the elephant is so immediately recognizable, it all but overwhelms the hand

In my case, even the "all but" did not happen, i.e., I only saw the elephant. I thought you were calling it "elepHAND" simply because of the ring (and the (elep)hant/hand similarity). (I didn't quite buy this suggestion.)

There is actually a bit more than that (the four legs and the trunk forming the five fingers).

Thanks for the reply. Good luck with the show.

VC
PS: I wonder whether the tease would have worked better if you rotated the picture 180 degrees. The elephant would be less overwhelming then and the hand more prominent. I will print and see for myself. [The other alternatives -- rotating the monitor 180 degrees ot standing on my head to view -- are not practical ]

This post has been edited by VC1: Mar 26 2005, 12:45 AM

Of the ones I have looked at so far, Gallery 5 is the one I like best, with Peacock and La Chanteuse the best ones in the gallery. (I can only look at a few at a time. Otherwise, they all start looking more or less alike.) La Chanteuse seems almost (but not quite Chinese). The whimsy that didn't quite work in ElepHAND works so easily in Peacock.

I was asking myself which of the two I like better [and thus prolonged avoidance of Calc II's Infinite Series ]. It is La Chanteuse, for the details. I will now go read what others have written.

VC

Manjula,

Thanks for sharing your work with us. Others are seeing Japanese influence and I'm seeing Russsian (especially in Carpet Man). I love that Carpet couple. What a splendid way to show off your talent with detail!

Do you ever model your work after real people? (I mean, do your human faces bear resemblance to people you know or see, or are they completely made up?)

Me too!

And an interesting point about the Russian effect. I wonder if this is mostly part of the Central Asian continuum that shows in the carpets? Meaning a kind of esthetic bridge between North & South Asia, via nomadic motifs.

cj

Hey,

I just got elepHAND: It's a HATHi!

Loved that. Talk about translating humour.

Brilliant, Roshna! Never crossed my miind.

Anjali

Thank you, Anjali, Roshna, Ajit, Ceajay and VC! (did I get everyone?) -- good one, Roshna! A pun in two languages! Kewl. It never occurred to me either.

VC1, I am amused to imagine someone turning the monitor 180 deg around ...

La Chanteuse was amongst the early ones -- when I was still unsure how to make the transition from drawing as an illustrator and as an artist. It's not easy to be precise about the difference. Many people have liked LC but I find myself a little wary of her ... a little TOO obviously decorative, I think. I prefer the Carpet Couple, who were amongst the last nine plates I made at the studio.

I think of the man as a Russian even though, while I was working on the plate, I had Persian Carpets -- though the results are actually closer to Bukhara Rugs -- in mind (we lived in Iran for a couple of years when I was a child). It was an odd thing: when I started on the plate, I had the feeling I was going to mess up. I had drawn in the eyes, nose, mouth and started on the beard, all without feeling a sense of the finished drawing and no confidence either about what it would turn out like. I did NOT have a clear notion of where the drawing was going -- nor did I have carpets in mind.

The instrument I was using was the needle-point of an old-style gramophone, set in a holder. The medium was what it generally is with acid-etched plates, i.e., the fine layer of resin (sometimes bee's) wax coating the surface of the plate. No pressure is needed to scratch the plate (unlike in engraving) and if one makes a mistake in the wax, it CAN be patched up -- but of course that's messy and a bit sissy too, not something one wants to do. Ideally you make your mark in the wax and then dip the plate in a mild acid solution, and wherever the metal beneath the wax has been exposed, it is "bitten" by the acid, leaving a groove as fine as the point of the drawing instrument. That groove is later filled with ink, which is what eventually gets transferred to paper.

All through the beard, I felt I was messing up ... it was going to be a purely decorative, rather meaningless print (these were the thoughts in my head) and I was going to have to wipe the plate clear and start again ... In this mood, I drew one shoulder, the rounded one (I think it's the left shoulder in the printed version, but of course on the plate, which is the reverse of the print, it was the right shoulder) and immediately detested the result. Feeling certain I would soon abandon the effort, I then drew the other shoulder as a square corner, just to see what it would look like. Then I drew a line just beneath that line, then added the fringe -- and very suddenly, I could sense the shift in perspective that occurs when a drawing comes into its own -- the moment when it announces itself and dictates how the rest of it should follow -- a bit like recognizing a tune from hearing the opening bars.

I was very thrilled with the finished result. I don't know if that seems self-congratulatory -- but I often feel surprised by the results of my work and not especially possessive. I never entirely believe I can draw and always look forward to the tiny "click" that sometimes (not always) occurs, which announces a shift of the sort I've described above.

No, I haven't based these faces on any particular friends/people, though I do sometimes. Like many artists, I have a handful of stock characters that I draw without thinking and it's when I am bored with these familiar characters that I search for inspiration from amongst my friends, using them as mental reference points -- Gautam's beard, Roshan's curly hair, Ajit's leather boots, that kind of thing.

manjula,

i really appreciate the candid look you're giving us into your creative process. it is interesting to get a sense of the combination of randomness and influence that some of your work seems to emerge from. looking at the carpet figures now that they're finished it is difficult to believe that they were not intricately visualized before you began. but you seem to be suggesting that the pieces find their own logic and almost work themselves out once they have.

arnab