Born in the lockdown: Art, music, a comic book gone virtual
When artist Vikrant Bhise ran out of art paper in the lockdown, he started using magazine and newspaper pages to continue his series on the plight of the migrant labourer. In this way, the tragedies of the pandemic infused yet another dimension into his work. The four members of metal band Eternal Returns learned the basics of sound engineering so they could record their already-delayed-by-Covid album out of their new home studios. The graphic artist Appupen released his second Rashtraman comic online, for free, and hopes that when print becomes an option again — when comic conventions and other events return — they will be pandemic-era collectibles, precisely because they couldn’t be sold until it was all over.
Here’s a look at what it’s been like to create independent art in the pandemic, pushing new boundaries, finding ways to be heard in a world that remained masked and locked away.
New notes
Eternal Returns, a four-member metal band, was planning to celebrate their decade-long run and 50 live performances with the release of their first-ever recorded album, Reprieved to Totality, in April.
They had only managed to record their first track when the lockdown was announced.
We’ll wait a month, they thought — they being vocalist Narendra Patel, 33; guitarist Vineet Pillay, 29; bass guitarist Harsh Makwana, 28; and drummer Pawan Sharma, 35.
As the lockdown dragged on, though, they found they couldn’t even do their weekly jam sessions together, separated as they were from each other and their music studio by the vast distances between the suburbs of a now-trainless Mumbai.
Meanwhile, at work — all four have day jobs, ranging from financial consultant to content producer — the stress was building and the men decided they needed some respite.
So, in August, they invested Rs 1 lakh each to create studio setups in their homes, buying hardware and software that they’re still paying off on EMI. “We just had to do it,” Patel says.
Sharma bought an electronic drum set; Patel and the others bought software and high-end computers. The men then spent four nights watching YouTube videos and consulting with friends to iron out the many glitches they faced. “We’re musicians, not sound engineers. In a studio, all we had to do was plug in our guitars,” Patel says.
They could now jam together long-distance, as long as the internet held. Recording tracks this way meant that, every time someone’s internet connection buffered, the whole band had to take it from the top all over again.
A 30-minute album that should have taken less than a week to record, took the musicians three months.
But eventually, there was triumph despite the odds. Reprieved to Totality, now an unintentionally ironic title, was released on November 14. Philadelphia’s Decibel magazine, a renowned publication for metal music, reviewed the album online. “Setting up our home studios gave us some sound engineering skills, which has bettered our craft,” Patel says. “That however doesn’t substitute for the creative exchange that happens when four of us are physically present in the same space.”
Virtual satire
In an exciting turn in Appupen’s second Rashtraman comic, Rashtrayana II: Divide and Fool, sidekick Cowboy turns against him. To teach him a lesson, Rashtraman uses Cow-vid, a new virus that sweeps across Cowboy’s home province, Cowrashtra.
The 100-page Rashtrayana II is a satire on power and politics, packed with action, espionage and betrayal, and the Cow-vid story was conceptualised amid the pandemic. Eventually, Appupen (real name George Mathen; day job graphic artist) decided to publish the comic book online, suspending its print avatar.
“People were consuming a lot of content online and I was tired of waiting for the lockdown to end and for my work to be sold at comic events again.”
The events are where most sales happen for him, and without them he decided he might as well release the work free, for now. Since September, he’s been uploading one 10-page episode a week on the Instagram page of the comic platform that he runs (@braindedindia) and website (brainded.in).
There is a plan for a print version later on — with additional material and outtakes. “The virtual version has definitely reached a lot of people. And I hope that if I ever decide to print this version, a few of my online readers will buy it as a keepsake,” he says.
Appupen self-published the first edition of Rashtraman in 2019, and sold it for Rs 200 per copy. In its digital avatar, the comic looks the same. “While it’s not made for the phone, or Instagram, it looks good on the laptop,” he says.
In the lockdown, Appupen also began work on another digital comic, which is based in his fantasy world Halahala. “The lockdown was a good time for me. First off, Bengaluru, which is always under-construction became quiet and the air became better,” says Appupen. “For the first time the city was moving at my pace, slightly slower, and I wasn’t running around all the time. That boosted my creativity.”
Drawing despair
Artist Vikrant Bhise, a graduate of Raheja College and the JJ School of Art, lives close to Mumbai’s Eastern Express Highway. His house is surrounded by under-construction buildings and the everyday pounding and drilling had become part of his life. Then one day, it all went quiet. “The hundreds of labourers I saw day in and day out suddenly just vanished,” Bhise says.
A few days later, he saw hordes of them walking hundreds of miles home, along the highway, thirsty, hungry, in distress, trailing little children and holding all they could carry of the lives they had lived in the city.
The 2018 Lalit Kala Akademi award winner started drawing what he saw and posting on his Instagram (@vikrantbhise_artist) and Facebook (@vikrantbhise.artist) pages. When he ran out of art paper, he began working with pages from newspapers and magazines, adding a new dimension to his work.
“The lockdown taught me a lot, gave me a lot of time to work, even though sustenance was slightly tough as all the galleries were closed and I also had to close down the art classes I run for art college students,” says Bhise. Before the lockdown, he had sold works at group shows and had a solo exhibition at the Jehangir Art Gallery, earning Rs1 lakh to Rs3 lakh per piece. This year he has had to dip into savings to survive.
“But I am not complaining. I was in a much better situation than my subjects,” he says. “Also, a few of my regular clients were kind enough to buy works from my migrant series, so I could continue the project.”
