What happens when a school boy relentlessly studies and works
at chemistry lab to create C20H25N30 a.k.a LSD? Well, the teacher tests it and
he gets the A+ grade!! The school boy eventually becomes the social media
sensation as Adarsh Balaak (ideal boy) with 1504 shares in Facebook, 7902
comments and 42000+ page likes! An anarchic contemporary comic character
evolved from the golden day’s ‘adarsh balaak’ posters (which have been used as
the instructional charts at Indian schools to promote good habit in 70s and
80s) are now one of the most popular comic strip series among youth.
Comicandcola.com website mentions “Mumbai artist Priyesh
Trivedi has recently blown up on the Internet with his painted comic series,
Adarsh Balak, in which Trivedi takes the familiar icon of 80's Indian
school-texts and educational charts and re-purposes him in a variety of
subverted images and narratives: here he is offering a joint to his father as
he works late into the night, here he sits curbside swigging beer from the
bottle as his friends graffiti the wall besides them, here he is tricking his
chemistry teacher into dropping some acid and giving him an 'A.' The 23-year
old Trivedi has so far been pursuing animation as a career, but it's his new
comic which has bought him to wider attention and acclaim; striking a chord
with a generation of young adults like himself who have grown up with the
neatly turned out schoolboy decorating their books, and take pleasure in seeing
him turn against the lessons he once taught. It's the delight of seeing
recognised associations in unexpected situations that shocks and amuses, and
resonates- here, especially, the good boy gone bad, and the contemporary references
-'swag' paired with something that represents traditional, conservative
values.” The website further adds “It
began with one image: last year, Trivedi made a poster of a young boy rolling a
joint with ‘T for Toke’ emblazoned across the top in Devanagari script that
emulated the Barakhadi charts, which would depict a young boy undertaking
various 'good' and 'correct' practices, used in many Indian schools. The image
proved popular, spreading quickly thanks to the internet, and selling a number
of prints. It was easily the most successful thing Trivedi had done, and he was
encouraged by the response to create further and expand on the theme, which led
to the production of the comics. In an interview with Visual Disobedience, he
credits the swift popularity of the strips to 'the love for nostalgia and the
archaic which most of us have that is partly responsible for the popularity. I
always found the visual styling of the educational charts from the ‘80s and
early ‘90s very amusing. Most of the people relate to this style because they
probably went to school when these charts were widely prevalent.'
Tridevi's strip is still in its fledgling stages, but it's
generating a lot of clamour- with some comparing his work to that of Spanish
cartoonist Joan Cornella. I can see why- the strong, bright painted visuals,
and the superficially thematic similarities of a satirical social deviance, but
Cornella is much more biting, more out there, more surreal, and also plays
around with the notion of visual illusions. Either way, Tridevi's a fan: 'I
love Joan’s work. He’s definitely an inspiration not just for this series but
for me as an artist in general. In fact, quite a lot of people have told me
that my work reminds them of Joan which I kind of take as a compliment since I
look up to him. Stylistically we are very different but it’s because he has
already created a niche for bizarre and unsettling stuff.”
Trivedi is now launching the printed posters and other articles
with the same theme. In one interview he has stated “'The style which I could
relate to the most was surrealism and psychedelic art. Up until two years ago,
I was really big on psychedelic art. That style of art was very intuitive for
me. I didn't have to try, it just flowed from my head onto the canvas. But as
an artist, I think it's very important not to settle on just one thing. Keep
experimenting and see what works for you. I'm very afraid of belonging to any
one niche. I dabbled with realism, I dabbled with abstract art, I dabbled with
psychedelic art. I've even tried my hand at sculpting..”
Here’s one more set of painting by Priyesh.
Why the hell, an anarchic paradoxical character is becoming popular? Is it that
the youth in India are fed up being the ‘good boys’? Are they irritated on how
the education is delivered in this country to convert them into robotic
stereotypes? Or is it the simple anarchic tendency to ‘appear’ different
from the crowd?Well, time will tell in near future. One can see the random use of Hindi slang as comments, in most of his artworks posted at social media.... the vent of anger or fun to become radical?
here's the original 'ideal boy' chart:
Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/adarshbalak?fref=photo
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