Diary Notes:
The process of redressing the street has begun. Khirki, the location of our community project is in for a complete makeover. Our community project is pure experiment as of now. We decided it would be a good idea to paint the shutters and walls facing the street. The design has to appeal to the people living on the street, which is essentially poor labor or small shop owners. The design should not compromise our sensibilities either. The process of designing the mural has taken us longer than painting it would take. With suggestions and critical analysis and the help from Pooja, Subba, Hemant, Soham and n number of revisions of the design I have finally managed to create something that everyone liked. But the big question for me is will the people of this street like it? Well we will soon find out.
The wall is plastered and ready for action. Today we invited the wife of the man who owns the property, to draw the first stroke on the mural. The artists have completed the drawing. We got plenty of curious onlookers. I think the process of creating it and eliciting a reaction from the onlookers is more important than how beautifully it is executed.
The artists on this project are Sonia Mehra Chawla, Simrin Mehra, Sanjay Sharma, Rohini Devasher and Ram Bali Chauhan, all one time of the College of Art, Delhi. They all seem to be having a great time doing this. The initial fright of climbing the scaffolding disappeared once they started working. Khoj is paying for the project; we are not paying the artists for painting for us. We have provided them with the material and lunch.
Tomorrow we will start applying color. So far so good, once the mural begins to take a more concrete shape it will be very exciting to just stand by and watch the reaction of the people. It really is a sight to see 3 girls and 2 boys standing on a tall scaffolding and painting.
The artists were in great form today. Completing more than half of the painting they were beaming at the end of an exhausting day out in the sun.
We had quiet an audience today. Some of who actually sat through the whole day just watching the artists mixing colors, applying the paint and scurrying about. I chatted with a group. They work for the local contractor next door. They said they liked what they saw of the mural. Gandhi, they said was the best choice for a face on their street. I tried in turn to explain why 5 young people were hanging from a scaffolding, painting away. I told them that we should be proud of the street we work/live in. They all agreed. I also brought up the issue of the desperate need for a concrete road. They all said they would do whatever they could to help as long as we took the initiative. I told them since you do not come in our studios to look at the shows, we have dragged the show to the street so that they could enjoy art as well. I think this made them feel special. All these people are from Jharkhand, living and working in Delhi, all of them have left their families behind in the villages. All RJD patrons, Lalu fans. They all voted for him.
They are all waiting for the mural to be completed. We were greeted with innumerable curious onlookers/passersby.
The other lot on the street- Pradeep Das Gupta (photographer-resident), the architects from BRB office, Ashok Lal (architect-resident) all think this is a great idea. The ripple effect of this mural will last a long while. Firstly I am going to invite Jeetu, the local MLA, to come and see the artists painting. Try and convince him that we are making an effort to make this a better place and ask him to help us push the process of building a road for the people here.
On the other hand the artists are having a great time doing this. Simrin has finally managed to climb right to the top of the scaffolding after ditching her phobia of heights. She had a little helper today, Laxmi- the daughter of a food vendor on the street. She enthusiastically picked up the brush and offered to help the artists. Sanjay has spent the whole day trying to get the portrait of Gandhi right. Every time he climbed down to look at the portrait form a distance he decided it was all wrong, so up he went and down again all day long. Sonia and Rohini have almost competed the lower level, enjoying the whole process of recreating Van Gogh on such a huge scale. Ram, a sculptor by profession has taken to the brushed very well. All in all, it is a great team and the fact that we managed to complete most of it in one day, goes to show the team spirit.