FLIGHT 1 MNUTE CARICATURES - COIMBATORE- DELHI - 13.11.2014

The waiting lounges in the airports are unlike the railway platforms where myriad faces spattered with drops of sweat of anxiety would pass you by or the bus stations where usually only local people bearing mainly just the known troughs and crests of facial topography wait morosely. The airport lounge would have only smatterings of people but mostly would have gaunt features or faces 'gauntified' by excessive self-importance. As a caricaturist gypsy, I was not strange to drawing such chaps too in the airports. But this time, it must have been a sort of record vis a vis the distance crossed/the air time spent . I had drawn 33 but only 25 came out of my ramshackle camera clean.

The first one I drew called for immediate execution as he was an unmistakable mix of my Kochi acquaintance, the ferocious public interest litigant, the late Nawab Rajendran and the bachelor local artist of Fort Kochi, Desmond. I had expected dismissing fireworks but the guy was too mellow for a Viswamitra lookalike. He was the Swedish Head of Mutt established by Maharshi Mahesh Yogi and looked after the cultural megashows of the Sect. I enquired about levitation and the bearded ex-engineer from the IIT convulsed into unstoppable laughter. I clarified that of all people in the airport lobby I knew more about body mass and the effects of gravity. "If you are OK with falling down , no harm in levitating", the ripples of laugh echoed everywhere. 

Then, the oozingly sexy girl just sat next to me after an unnecessary round of the lobby stalls and smiled at me in expectation. She had to be smiled back at

Of the three cabin crew, the fattest and the elderly of the cabin crew invited me to their portion of the plane and the three volunteered one by one. She was a delight to chat with, but that was for half a minute.

I wish all of them clean laughs and long hassle free lives . Hi Ho !

  

1 MINUTE CARICATURES at FORT KOCHI

18/12/2011, Sunday : 1 MINUTE CARICATURES of three famous people in Fort Kochi area in Kerala were done at the Art gallery owned by my artist friend Dinesh Shenoy whose and talented young sculptor Sathish's works were on display there.

1. NP Ramaswamy, the AIR A-Graded vocalist. The man whom I had listened to for scores of hours during my school-college days through the All India Radio. He was taller than I expected.

2. K.N. Sathyapalan, former Secretary, Kerala Lalitha Kala Academy. Now in the thick of controversy surrounding the Kochi- Muziris Biennale, where names of artists Bose Krishnamachary and Riaz Komu, bureaucrat Dr.V.Venu and former minister M.A. Baby are doing the rounds.

3. Desmond Rebeiro, the freebird, vinoba bhave-lookalike artist with matted hair, who owns a neat one room art gallery in one of the main streets in Fort Kochi, where he sleeps in the night in a hammock ! He should be one of the most prolific and hard selling artists in Fort Kochi area !

 

Writer KN Shaji, once a pioneer of little magazines (Samkramanam et al)

helps Desmond to steady the paper

1 Minute at an art gallery in Kochi

When I opened the door at 7am in my government quarters, there stands the compulsive cyclist of an artist, apolegetically snuggled to the wall, armed with that disarming smile - Dinesh R Shenoy again – that incomparable craftsman of monumental buildings in monochromatic sepia ! For statistical purpose, had to invite the Fort Kochi artist who was already in and about to be seated on the dining chair.

I have drawn Dinesh twice earlier and posted down here. But the two you see here were to amuse my deaf, chronically asthmatic AMMA who I could see struggling these days to get out of the trauma of the death of her elder sister, of whom she hoped to become neighbour one beautiful day. Just 2 minutes, and I could make her smile once again at my scribble pad.

I always remind my Siddharth to take care to nudge to his grandma....touch her...and if he can, smile at her while she goes through the obituary columns in the newspaper because she is going through something terrible that millions of old people like her anywhere in this world never wish to share with anybody. I could see my mother heaving heavily while struggling to balance on her weak limbs onway to the kitchen to make coffee for her son's friend.

No one can explain breath better than an asthmatic....

10 minutes later at the gallery where the train 

drawings of Dinesh hung in special frames. 

Perhaps, this simple looking young man would be the pathbreaker to that gallery culture where in you could 

shop for originals worth from Rs.100 to 1,00,000.

The owner of the teashop next to the smallest gallery perhaps in the whole of Kerala. In 20 minutes, I would cajole the 'boy' who brought the black tea with his caricature, futher unsettling the  standoff between the bourgeoisie hotel owner and the younger prolet.

This Infopark engineer with kid in arms who passed by was the first to volunteer. By reflex, I ran my fingers through the back of my head. There was a time when the comb refused to proceed further through the dense black forest. I looked at the young man again with envy but then the baby gave me hope.. HiHo !

Come to Netteppadam Road across Govt. Girls HS, Ernakulam and you will find this effervescent SRK lookalike, more SRKish if he chooses not to bare teeth. Beneath the half a dozen layers of knitwear lies  a panicky, intensely deep prayer invoking the Gods of 6 to 8 packs ...

Typical trade street fare this. Here is  a helper from the neraby

Ayurvedic pharmacy. The red smear in the forehead has been

correctly positioned to square off the villainy on the face :)

Colleague & Senior-in-arms of the above in

Ayurveda matters was exactly not a success.

The traditional cap donned by this photogenic chap 
during special occasions has been not so 
cleverly concealed behind the caricature.

One of the thousands of insecure drivers in the city. 
He was so eager to show the surprise to his kids, 
I was insensitive to ask the names of... :(

An official in the government furniture store. The pefectionist cut short his smile seeing the 'thing' to the right, my 5 second furniture that I decided to display before signing off.

The cricket fanatic boy watched by 
his shy mother from a distance...

The plumber of the bylane

then, the travel agent..

next, the clerk in the courier agency...

followed by the rich son of the teastall owner we met earlier..

My predecided 20 minutes was about to be finished. I had announced, just 2 more, I would be going .... I had forgotten to ask the vocation of the chap. Just seated him in the most unstable wooden bench I created in recent times..

JAYANT, the gallery owner. I only wish he learns the trade of packing his wares the earliest. His son (below) whom I drew on the inaugural day might one day save his father from debts with his exceptional watercolours ...

 

The hotel'boy' I referred earlier suddenly 
flaredhis dental structure without provocation, 
which would be any caricaturists instant delicacy. 




2 days back...

Dines chose 'me' as most suited to fill the smallest gallery

               Akkado Mikkado or whatever, the offeseason tourist                                 who relented while casually ushered in by the artist