scribbles, scribbles and more scribbles
“When you find yourself cocooned in isolation and you cannot find your way out of darkness…
Remember this is similar to the place where caterpillars go to grow their wings”
Necole Stephens
One fine morning, we noticed the hordes of butterflies migrating. For some reason, I had never paid attention to this phenomenon but these slow months under enforced lockdown has made me more aware of the surroundings and this sort of migration was new to me. A friend, also a crazy butterfly enthusiast, told us stories behind it. His eyes lit up talking about these delicately beautiful creatures and his birthday happened to be around the corner. So what better gift than something to do with these winged wonders.
For a few months now, I have been thinking of working on a concertina, only thing missing was the subject for it. And here I had few butterflies to draw. Both put together became a butterfly concertina. My apprehensions of using any kind of colour has been dominant as ever but what fun would be butterflies without colours. In the process of research for what species to draw, a whole new section of the natural world opened up for me.
Needless to say, most of us are going through a tough phase in life dealing with the pandemic and the roadblocks that come along. All of us cocooned in our houses trying to stay safe yet that doesn’t mean the confines of the walls doesn’t affect us mentally. Nature comes to rescue again! Cocooned for a while until we emerge out of it with wings.
For some reason, self preservation becomes my first response to any kind of uncomfortable situation. Life in the city after a full year in the Jungle became too difficult to handle. Unaware of how deep I had sunk in, one fine day I reached close to the breaking point. It seemed easier to banish every societal facade and take time off to recover from the emotional damage I had done to myself unknowingly. A week far away from the chaos of the city within the shell of my hermitage, I had recovered the energy and the zeal to go back and face everything that I ran away from. That’s when I thought of the hermit crab, a member of the living world who looks for a shell appropriate for its size and need to protect itself and go on living.
Red munia or strawberry finch, as the name suggests, is a striking red sparrow sized bird found in tropical Asia. The males and females are generally a dull brown colour with multiple white spots. The male develops this red breeding plumage and white streaks under the eyes during the monsoon months in the South of India. The pairs build their nests together using blades of grass, feathers, pieces of charcoal etc. In this piece, the male is seen carrying a ruffled feather from the surrounding to build its nest.
Couple of years ago, a friend suggested I take up the Inktober challenge. I had no idea what that was and I went looking for anything that had a #inktober on Instagram. That looked like a super cool challenge and I decided to take it up. But three days into the month, I ran out of steam because I had no idea what I could do with those prompts and if I want to go by my own prompts, I should have planned it well. Bottom line – I didn’t think I had the creativity nor the motivation to take up such a commitment.
Inktober is about 50 days away. Irrespective of what the prompt list looks like, I want to complete the challenge this year. So as a practice I started making ink sketches of scenes all around me or some from memories.
These scenes somehow get etched in mind the moment one decides to sketch them but doing them all on a black and white and shaded style gives you a different feel.
All this while, I have used marker pens with consistent flow of ink. And my dip pen with all the different nibs sat in the drawer all these years patiently waiting for me to pick it up and admire the value of it. So here it is. The rediscovery of the dip pen.
The uneven lines, the inconsistent flow of the ink and the imperfections of inking a memory or a view on paper is exciting at a different level. I hope the dip pen doesn’t have to go back to its box for another couple of years without being used.
More to come later…
Tadoba National Park is one of the jungles I have on my list to visit. It isn’t open all round the year and that’s what makes it difficult to approach because before you know all of it is booked for the winters. And visiting a jungle in unbearable heat is not an option I would ever consider. So Tadoba visit stayed in the list and got pushed down until I was approached to work on an advertising based presentation for newly set up eco-friendly resort. The group of Red Earth resorts have been around already in Kabini, Karnataka and Wayanad, Kerala for a while now. As the content for the presentation poured in, I had one more reason added to the Tadoba visit. A stunning place and must visit place!
My recent work using coloured inks was the Brown Fish Owl and the finished artwork gave me the confidence to use them to paint birds. Not all bird sketches may look appealing in monochrome.
The first bird that came into mind to experiment further with coloured inks: a Toucan. Colorful birds with colourful beaks! While looking for pictures on instagram and google, I looked out of the window and spotted a bright orange bird on a tree outside the house. An extremely skittish bird, the orange minivet was flying and hopping around branches. In an instant, the far away toucans from a different continent and hemisphere took a back seat, and came home the Orange Minivet.
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One dot at a time 