Dripping Sins

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Dripping Sins (2003)

… then … as sin dripped down from the sky … sin dripping down … sin dripping … and then … dripping from the sinful sky … the sins of the sinful sky … only a trickle … only … just … no more than … sins gathering sins accumulating … sins accruing sins multiplying … sins swelling sins surging … more sins piled on sins … and more sins heaped on sinful sins …
[ Tr. by Madhuban Mitra ]

Ensuite … la pêche descendait du ciel en coulant vers la terre … et en coolant du ciel pêchant … et les pêches du ciel pêchant … qu’un chatouillage… rien que la pêche … se reunissent … s’accumulent … s’accroissent … la pêche gonflante … la pêche sautante … plus de pêches posées sur la pêche … et plus de pêches balancées sur la pêche péchante …
[ Tr. by Rouflaquettes Dorees ]

Poésie-visuelle de Samit-Rouflaquettes

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This is one of my own favorites. Few years back, while trying to understand the enormous amount of possibilities that could be generated by putting image and text together and fusing them into one comprehensive concept, I realized if I remove all direct references of the so called 'image' part of this unique concoction of 'image' and 'text' and use only the visual elements generated from the 'text' part, it might lead me to another set of possibilities. Letters do have their own visuals. A line of text has a specific visual appeal, apart from its literal meaning and literary connotations. It has specific shapes, lines and colors - the essential ingredients for an 'image'. It is like, drawing with text.

I was trying to create a visual image of sins, constantly dripping from the endless sky and piling up forming a heap of sins. I formed a long and continuous sentence, as if it is an one-line description of the entire scene and used that text to generate a visual form which suggests something is dripping down continuously and piling up at the bottom. It worked for me!

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Comics

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Comics (2004)

Since my childhood, I was always mesmerized by the magical world of images and text of comic books and the bikini-clad girlfriends of the super heroes with their funny graphical sounds like, "YEEEEKS" and "BLAAAAM" and "VROOOOOMS" in bold and extruded typeface, crossing the boundaries of those small boxy frames and rigid panels. I always wanted to create a comic strip, but it never happened till date. The only thing that I could do is to fuse one of my unfinished poem about a weekend trip to a rejected photograph from the same trip and make a conscious effort to simulate the eerie ambience of the first cell of a dark action comics strip - still without a story, waiting for a hostile moment to begin its journey through the pages of our childhood fears.

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Sketch: Self-portrait # 82

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Digital Sketch: Self-portrait # 82 (2006)

I am always very much fascinated by the idea of self-portraits. An image, that portrays one's self - that is how I perceive them. This whole idea of self-portrait, however, leaves me in the middle of a strange circus of representations, where everyone is moving with their faces covered with a blank page of a sketch book. When they meet each other, they quickly draw self-portraits and simply exchange them.

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Reflection

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Reflection (2006)

Sometimes, I do feel that it is nothing but a reflection! A reflection that covers the sceen, the chips, cables, ports, keyboard - everything!

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Early Illustration

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Illustration (1989)

Those were my days of prints and papers and PTS and ink; news papers and Sunday Edtions. The beginning of my career as a visual artist. I was in my late teen then and I used to like the smell of rubber solution!

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Another Early Illustration

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Illustration (1990)

Another story illustration from the initial days of my career as a Commercial Artist cum Illustrator for a local newspaper!

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Urban Conversation - A Concept Sketch

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Urban Conversation - A Concept Sketch

I like to simulate the feel of analog media - the good old pencils and rolls of art paper, in my digital works!

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Iconic Emotions: Jealous

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Iconic Emotions: Jealousy (2001)

An image from my Illustration series called 'Iconic Emotions'!

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Iconic Emotions: Amazed

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Iconic Emotions: Amazed (2001)

Another image from my illustration series called 'Iconic Emotions'!

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Magazine Cover: Chirantan

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Magazine Cover: Chirantan (2003)

I designed this cover for a Bengali Literature Magazine, named Chirantan.

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And Birds & Myriad Birds

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And Birds & Myriad Birds (2004)

... and birds and birds and birds and myriad birds spouted from my head ...

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This is another image from my Visual Poetry collection. Being a poet and a literature enthusiast, I always like working with text. Again, on the other hand , my designer self is never satisfied with simple, conventional display of text forming a linear pattern. I noticed, how the entire meaning of the text could be changed if I display them in an unconventional manner, following the psychological patterns, evoked by the inner meaning of that particular text piece.

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Gnarled & Tangled

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Gnarled & Tangled (2003)

… indeed … our gnarled and tangled roots condense thicken deepen … plumbing quite deep now, shallow next…probing … delving deep again … up for air in a moment … up up … and pause … cease … abate … yet down once more … unfathomable … bottomless … deep into the impregnable squares of stones ...
[ Tr. by Madhuban Mitra ]

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I really don't like to call them Visual Poetry, but I never had a better word! However, on a second thought I realized that no other word can express the idea, other than this one - Visual Poetry. I consider them as 'poetry' and they are quite 'visual', too!

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Other Side of The Bread

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Book Cover - Rutir Opith (2006)

The other side of our bread! We have never seen that! Or did we? I remember, when I worked for this Bengali novel, Rutir Opith (Other Side of The Bread) by Kamal Chakraborty, I enjoyed it a lot. Kamal Chakraborty is one of my favorite writers of contemporary Bengali Literature. So I was completely overwhelmed when he asked me to design the cover for his book, Rutir Opith. It was a fascinating novel, running through the obscured and narrow lanes between real and unreal.

More about my cover designs for Bengali novels and poetry collections »

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Theme Image - KICHAINGAATHAA

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Theme Image for KICHAINGAATHAA (2006)

The theme image for my prose piece KICHAINGAATHAA!

'Kichain' is a Bangla slang for public chaos and 'Gaathaa' means a Ballad. I was trying to capture the day-to-day chaos of our civilized, urban life, in this prose piece. The language and theme of this piece is very prosaic and based on typical urban aggressiveness. It is never lyrical or does not have any influence of conventional parameters of a so called 'Ballad'. Still, I wanted to call it as a 'Ballad', as I strongly feel that the lyrical mellowness and smoothness of a ballad, is replaced by the harshness and chaotic darkness of a city, when it is juxtaposed against an urban backdrop.

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Poet In Search Of His Muse

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Poet In Search Of His Muse (1999)

Statutory Warning

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Statutory Warning (1999)

One of my early digital works - Statutory Warning! The Bengali text in the images says something like, "The night passes by and I think of you!" Very romantic, indeed!

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Sketch Untitled

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Untitled Sketch (2005)

I always like to overlap analog and digital techniques and mix two entirely different textures and moods together, forming a third layer, on the same image.

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Self-protrait #67

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Self-protrait #67 (2003)

This is on of the many self-portraits I have painted between 2002 and 2004. I was obsessed with the theme. Irrespective of whatever I wished to draw, I used to end up drawing two big eyes, a sad face, a prominent nose, a bald head, big ears - exactly like what I thought I should look like.

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Concept Sketch

Illustration

Read more about this illustration and the related project »

Book Cover

More about my cover designs for Bengali novels and poetry collections »

Sonnyas

More about my cover designs for Bengali novels and poetry collections »

Wild Pepper Forest

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