Looking at the big picture

Vaibhav Raj Shah is just a young artist doing big things. Literally. He's just finished a 190 feet wide by 34 feet high art installation on a building fau00c3u00a7ade in Maker Maxity Complex in the Bandra Kurla Complex. Inspired by Mumbai, the art is a dark flowing vision that reflects the dynamics of our city and incorporates folk art patterns representing all the diverse communities that make our city what it is. The artist talks to CS:



Big talk
After art school in Pune and a scholarship in Paris, I went on to the USA to study figurative works. That's where my interest in graffiti art and figurative art developed. I painted many important big graffiti sites for Commonwealth Games in 2008 and that's how I got this project. Although it is really a lot of hard back-breaking work (I had to spend hours and hours painting high up on a scaffolding, then climbing down and walking away 40 feet to check whether it came out right!), I love working on this kind of monumental scale. The impact is like seeing Shah Rukh Khan on a big screen; I find it really fantastic. It took me 7-8 months to complete this project from the first dot of sketch to the last drop of paint.

Mumbai fau00c3u00a7ade
The brief was Mumbai u00e2u0080u0094 the city, and it conjured up images of cash flows, culture dynamics and conflicts, implosion and explosion, almost like chemical reactions, taking in and giving out, but above all, a kind of madness, indifference and numbness. This is a city which is inclusive and broad-minded, so kind to everybody; in times of calamities, people go all out with their kindness and compassion to help others. But it's also a city which is narrow-minded, territorial and cruel. It doesn't care about where it's going, about its corruption and environment. What I have created is a reflection of all that madness.

There's a river-like force flowing in and out of the installation, like all the people coming to and moving out of the city. And I have used Madhubani motifs to represent UP, Warli symbols and Portuguese map designs, train map symbols to represent different cultures who have settled in this city. It is a dark nocturnal image that depicts how the culture is lost, but the form remains.

New dimensions
I am now experimenting with a new medium, but it is top secret (winks). I want to work on more such installations. I would love to also add a three-dimensional effect, maybe try and get sculptural works popping out of such installations. But above all, I would love for our city to have more public art. These huge commercial hoardings are destroying the urban landscape of Mumbai. I want to get serious graffiti artists in the city to come together and beautify this city with art. Our city needs to become more people-centric, not run on a auto-drive mode.