"Stick No Bills" // Desi Propaganda Art //

If you've grown up in India, or stayed here for any length of time, you'd have come across humorous, ironic stenciled messages and instructions on walls.

If you've grown up in India you've also witnessed the excessive labeling by every person associated to an individual.

This piece is a commentary on this. It is done in the style of propaganda art, combined with commonly found stenciled messages across the walls of India.

Clipping from Artwork: Stick No Bills by Jasleen Kaur

The Inspiration:

"Don't Pass Urine" Tamil signage setup at Copenhagen City Center as display. | Image By: Jonathan Marks

A bit of wisdom, a piece of mind or just plain instructions, these messages are the propaganda art of India. With our own lingo for everything such as "Original Copy", "No Warranty, No Guarantee", "Best Quality", India has developed its own phenomenological culture.

"Stick No Bills" is found stenciled all over walls in India. | Image by: Simon Lieschke

Phenomenology is described by the philosopher Heidegger as “the process of letting things manifest themselves.” and over a point of time, we've developed an interesting way of interacting and conveying messages, which is unique to our country and culture, and is often confusing even baffling to outsiders. This concept of Phenomenology has been thoroughly exploited by the likes of Shepard Fairey (founder & owner of OBEY, a global phenomenon in propaganda street art), graffiti artists such as Banksy, King Robbo (now Team Robbo, London) to comment on social issues, cultural movements or just as a way to challenge the status quo.

Street art in India usually is a western concept being adopted by aspiring young artists. This can be seen in initiatives such as St+art India bt The Street Art Foundation India), which brings together street artists and graffiti artists and aims at beautifying the streets of slum dwellings in Metropolitan cities. The recent Sassoon Docks Project, the Lodhi Art District etc. have brought graffiti and public/street art into limelight.

However, the OG Indian graffiti (street lingo often used to describe something that is the original perpetrator of a certain style or trend) or street art are the phrases painted onto

walls in India. Having witnessed them in various spellings, colors, languages and in various places all over India, was the inspiration for this social commentary piece on preserving your Identity in India.

The Concept:

If a young adult in India is ever asked to crib about something, they'd crib about how their aunt/uncle/masi/chachi keeps tagging them certain things or questions their inability to be tagged certain things. This piece was my take on the same. In a country obsessed with instructing, how does one reconcile with having or keeping their identity. And is our identity really ours?

Identity Crisis's by Jasleen Kaur | OG Artwork.

The "logo" is a loose interpretation of how the world perceives certain personality types. The color pallet of CMYK was chosen as can easily be accessed by most devices, which I believe is why the identity crisis discussions arise. People want a certain kind of accessibility, for a person to be "not difficult" or be "ideal". We are told enough about how to act, speak, talk, walk, all of this leading up to this sort of Utopian idea of an ideal personality type, that can easily fit into most situations as well as, if we are being honest, "households"

However, the logo's are skewed to show that it is almost impossible to achieve this kind of perfect "setting" and almost everything ends up a little skewed or offset (all printing lingo's)

The Final Product: