Design
by Bhakti Dalal
May 25, 2022
3-4 mins read
Today, illustrations can be observed all around us. For example posters, advertisements, video games, films, magazines and many more. There are ‘n’ number of artists, rendering styles and examples of illustration. But what makes illustration a preferred choice in the field of branding? Culture’ and ‘illustration’ are two vast topics and commonly used terms.
So, before diving into the topic let us just brush up on what the terms mean.
Culture can be explained as the ideas, customs and the social behavior of a particual group of people or a society. An individual’s belief system, thoughts, and experiences too are majorly influenced by the culture he/she has grown up and lived in.
Put in simple words, illustration is the visual depiction of any concept or idea by an artist. It can include paintings, drawings, sketches, cartoons and so on.
Both these terms being extensive and majorly subjective explaining their relation in a concise form becomes difficult. So, we will be going through the artworks of 2 artists and observe the differences. Following are 2 legendary Indian illustrators and cartoonists from the same era. Both of them have worked for similar kind of clients and have been loved by the audience till date. The artworks referred to are of Mario De Miranda and Rasipuram Krishnaswami Laxman (R. K. Laxman). You must have surely known about these two illustrators and remembered their work. Before observing their works, le us have a brief idea about their backgrounds.
(1926-2011)
Mario Miranda was born to catholic parents in Daman (then in Portuguese India).
He studied in St. Joseph’s high school Bangalore and St. Xavier’s College Mumbai
Earlier he worked for magazines and newspapers where his artworks used to be published. He then moved to countries like Portugal and London where he worked for different newspapers and television animation.
(1921-2015)
On the other hand, R. K. Laxman was born in Mysore in a Tamil Hindu family. He grew up in a big family of 10 people. Completing his schooling from a govt. school of Mysore and graduation from the University of Mysore he continued his freelance artistic activities. He worked for local newspapers, created famous mascots for brands like Asian paints and his creations also include sketches done for ‘Malgudi Days’ and ‘Wagle Ki Duniya’.
Below are illustrations depicting ‘family’ rendered by the mentioned artists. The artwork may be done for different purposes but the approach, the treatment, the details and the environment clearly define the cultural differences.
by R. K. Laxman
by R. K. Laxman
It is pretty obvious that the two pieces of work depict a different scenario of families altogether. besides these differences we
can observe other elements too which show the impact of the artist’s background. Right from the clothes, the posture of
people to the small background elements hold the essence of this impact.Example given, the family rendered by R. K.
Laxman (one on the left) is a typical Indian family. Looking at the furniture, the window, the kind of curtains one can
immediately tell about the ‘Indianness’ in the picture.
Whereas the scenario in Mario Miranda’s illustration (one on the right) depicts a whole lot of western influence. Here, we can
observe that the food items shown, the sitting arrangement and other details too, are usually less seen in Indian families. If
the dressing of the people is observed a mixture of Indian and foreign culture can be noticed. In the above comparison you
must have noticed how the small elements and their differences can bring a change in the environment of the artwork.
These are those details which help depict the culture of the illustration (situation depicted in it) more clearly and effectively.
Diving deeper, we can also observe the difference between the line treatment used by both the artists. The rendering style
used by Mario Miranda is more of closed and tight forms which give a touch of sophistication. On the other hand, loose andfree flowing lines can be seen in R. K. Laxman’s work. Although both the artists worked in the same city in the same era with a relatively similar style, yet their works differ largely. The way they perceived people, environments around them and what they saw differed according to their cultural differences.
Following are some more observations of artworks of these two artists.
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