Amidst the ‘cultured’ chaos at the recent Mumbai Art Fair, there was a little something that was different. What was it you ask? Well scattered all over the place were people, real live honest-to-God humans, wearing these particular T-shirts. So? What’s the big deal? Not like organized groups don’t wear clothing that inflicts its propoganda on unsuspecting passersby. It is with a sad and knowing shake of my head that I say- no, these were not obnoxious propoganda spreaders. These humans are for sale. Like a piece of art, these humans can bought and displayed at fancy Art Fairs or in your living room.

“I think he’ll go wonderfully with our new curtains darling.”

But we are civilized humans aren’t we? Of course we are bound by ethics in these matters. It’s not like the ‘owners’ are actually going to do anything bad to their ‘products’. Worse comes to worst, they’ll just forget the occasional dusting or feeding. Right?

No mommy! I don’t want a Princess Barbie! I want that person! I want you to buy me that person! Right now!

I really hope worse doesn’t come to that worst.

So the lady behind the ethical slavery, I’m sorry, conceptual art, Preeti Chandrakant is a conceptual artist based in Mumbai and Zurich. She explains the concept-

This is the first time ‘living works of art’ have been put up for sale.

You can send the person to parks and museums, and they will come back to narrate the experience and be an ‘intellectual extension’ of the buyer

So correct me if I’m wrong, you will sweat and toil to earn money, buy another human and send him backpacking around the globe on a trip entirely financed by yourself? And you’re not going yourself because? Oh, you want to work even more to earn even more money and send your purchase picnicking again, is it? But of course that’s completely rational.

And then you see these pictures on his facebook profile with captions like, ‘Sucks for you buddy. This ain’t even my on my own friggin credit card’

But what if, just what if, a purchase decides that he’s done with being bought and sold and makes a run for it on the next intellectual spree you send him on. I mean are they even insured?

“I’m so sorry sweetie. I’d bought you a real live person this Valentines Day. But he just ran away. I swear he did.”

On a more serious note, the question arises

Are we glorifying slavery in the name of conceptual art?

Not everyone’s all happy with this particular experiment. Many human rights watchdogs have expressed increasing concern over the project.

A human work of art, Purushartha Saini (31) says-

I am absolutely okay with being sold. As far as I know, it wuld be illegal if humans are sold without their consent. But if human rights activists oppose the sale, I am ready to fight a legal battle. I would stand up to be sold. If I want to do something, which is not jeopardizing your freedom… then you don’t have any ground to raise a voice.

And Mr. Saini isn’t the only one voraciously protecting and, should we say wanting, his right to be sold. Apparently 1000 people had volunteered to be ‘sculpted’ on since 2002. Only six- three Indians and three Europeans- have cleared the test and have been chosen ‘sale worthy’. (I’ll bet five out of the six are women). Speaking of which…

According to National Crime Records Bureau, 22,939 women were kidnapped in 2008 and rose to 25,741 in 2009. UNODC (United Nations Office of Drug and Crime) records on Southeast Asia say that 1,50,000people fall prey to trafficking every year.

Calling trafficking human art is just gross.

Now tattooing is a globally accepted form of art too. If someone likes another persons tattoo, he’s not going to buy the tattooed body part, is he? Or is amputation for the love of art acceptable too?

What do you think about this new project? Do you see a silver lining that I missed? Would you have volunteered for something like this? Just shoot me comment to let me know…

And I was wondering, how  the worlds population managed to touch seven billion, with nobody feeling the need for a new religion to keep up with the citizenry (there is heavy sarcasm at work here if you didn’t notice). Apparently someone did. And thus was born a new religion ‘Kopimism’ (copy+me+ism, get it?), the religion where you copy (I’d sure like to try that out for exams’ sake). Their philosophy is something like this:

* All knowledge to all
* The search for knowledge is sacred
* The circulation of knowledge is sacred
* The act of copying is sacred

In our belief, communication is sacred. Communication needs to be respected. It is a direct sin to monitor and eavesdrop on people.

We challenge all copyright believers – most of which have a great deal of influence in politics, and who derive their power by limiting people’s lives and freedom. What they most of all want to limit the knowledge.

                                                                                                                                     - Official Website

I see some strong PIPA and SOPA rebels.

And this, is their sacred symbol of sorts:

The caption they’ve given to it just takes the symbol to a whole new level

This little pyramid, termed Kopimi, is supposed to be the exact opposite of a copyright symbol. It is similar to the CC0 license created by Creative Commons, except the major difference being that the symbol encourages copying. The work bearing a kopimi symbol can be copied for whatever purpose, commercial or non-commercial (like people weren’t already doing that). The Kopimi concept and logo was created by Ibi Kopimi Botani (Ibrahim Botani) back in 2005.

Although the origins are unclear, the pyramid in the middle is supposed to signify the values of kopimism philosophy according to common interpretation.  The pixelated ‘K’ in the middle would obviously be a reference to the name of the religion. It is not all in all a very attractive symbol although it’s meaning and usage would override this little hindrance.

Kopimi may be put on homepages or blogs, in books, in software, as sound logos in music, or whatever. This may be very well and all, but I’m skeptical about this copying and still believe in originality of thoughts and ideas. But each to his own.

The Kopimi page contains various versions of the Kopimi logo, and explains that the logo is a symbol showing that the work is allowed to be copied.

Oh, and by the way, all those ‘kopimi’s up there don’t signify my consent to copy my stuff. Just saying…

These few months have been quite hectic and I’m pretty sure I haven’t heard the end of it yet. My answer to the application to the best design school ever, National Institute of Design, is yet to come and I’m so excited. Here’s whats been going on for the past few weeks:

• 7.1.11: NID first round. A design aptitude test which decides your acceptance into the second round, which is a studio test and finally an interview.
• 21.2.11: My finals! All the way until…
• 5.3.11: Postman brings the results of my first NID test
• 12.3.11: I’m officially done with school! Where did twelve years of schooling go?
• AFTER: Blogging, reading, drawing, and more applications!

The shop displaying students work

A historic monument of sorts inside the campus

Some sculptures

Surprised that a girl can like gritty, gruesome comics? Well, this one does. A lot. DC Comics made news by stating that it would reboot it’s original logo to something more snazzy. Here’s my take on DC Comic’s new logo.

Frankly, I wasn’t too thrilled when I first saw the logo designed by Landor. But after reading their philosophy I’ll have to say, I stand corrected.

The design of the new DC Entertainment identity uses a “peel” effect — the D is strategically placed over the C with the upper right-hand portion of the D peeling back to unveil the hidden C — symbolizing the duality of the iconic characters that are present within DC Entertainment’s portfolio.
— Press Release

Admitted that the monochrome logo does little to impress, and the peel back has an Adobe-Illustrator-y feel which could have been avoided, the superhero effects given to it gives way to endless possibilities. Seeing it on the comic books, balanced against the wordwork and graphics would possibly enhance its appearance overall. It’s not as cheesy and underwhelming as many thought it would be. On the whole, I think that the DC Comics identity reclaims this logo and is what will keep it ‘awesome’.

The logo in use seems pretty invisible

And then again, the characters add so much more

Anyhow, there’s an interesting contest that’s been making news lately – The Tanishq Mia My Expression Contest.

Mia is a range of jewelry which, as the ad campaign states, loves to go to work. As in it’s an entire collection based solely on the working woman’s need to accessorize. Pretty neat, eh? There’s a sizable cash prize up for grabs for the top ten finalists and that’s not even the best part. The winner gets a chance to collaborate wit h top designers at Tanishq to create their own freakin jewelry line!

This is what office jewelry looks like apparently

The huge disappointment for me came when I read that I have to be eighteen or above. I should have known something like that was too good to be true.

…and to think that I stood a chance to make good money by designing something like this

But there are lucky people out there who have passed that magical age of eighteen and can actually try their hand at something like this. All you have to do is design something that you’d like to wear yourself to work. The selection is based on attention to detail, creativity (duh!) and usability – like a ring that doubles as a pendant or something. So why not go ahead and make something of this chance. The contest ends on 26th January (IST), so I wouldn’t sit around waiting for inspiration to strike if I were you.

This doesn’t look so hard. Does it?

Here’s their video clip. It has examples of inspiration too. That is, if that’s what you’d call it.

]]> http://curiousfeline.wordpress.com/2012/01/22/a-smidge-of-a-post/feed/ 2 nivepatil tanishq, tanishq mia, tata enterprise, fine jewelry, competition, classy, work jewelry, work accessories tanishq, mia, jewelry, office ring, statement ring, gold ring, accessories, office wear Mia Jewellery earrings, office earrings, studs, mia, tanishq, tata, office jewelry, office accessories http://curiousfeline.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/le-first-post/ http://curiousfeline.wordpress.com/2012/01/13/le-first-post/#comments Fri, 13 Jan 2012 13:38:47 +0000 Nivedita http://curiousfeline.wordpress.com/?p=7 ]]> Hello there! As some of you may know, I’ve moved my blog from typepad to wordpress but on account of my not having a (dot)com address, was unable to move my posts to the new blog. Sorry about that.

Another thing, since I’m wrapping up my senior year, things are pretty hectic. Which is the reason there may not be many posts until late February. After that, you have no reason not to expect regular posts on my ticklish quest to design stardom.

Thanks for understanding y’all!  :)

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