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Creating the calendar girl
Anu Kumar
Marking time is a monumental art. And yet if you tried to equate these pages of history with art, purists would hurl themselves into a screaming frenzy.But calendars have for long given people a month-by-month capsule of popular culture. If it's December, you can look at Hema Malani as a sultry siren and if it's July, Nutan stares at you, a perfect picture of piety. These time-keepers not only reflect current star status, they also take the place of temples, wall hangings and canvases in most middle class homes. And yet, they are deemed not quite art. Breaking out of that mindset is Cymroza Art Gallery. Its latest exhibition titled From Goddess to Pin-Up: Icons of Feminity in Indian Calendar Art brings these garish, decorative objects of mass consumption into an art gallery for the first time. It also aims to interrogate the imagery that these calendars offer. Culled from a few thousand posters belonging to Patricia and J P S Uberoi, both sociologist's based in Delhi, approximately 100 posters have made
their way to the city. "This exhibition is also a feminist gesture besides introducing calendars as an art form," says Patricia. Sellers of calendar art usually classify their wares into four categories: the dharmic or religious icons, patriotic figures, family-as-the-nurturer symbols and the ubiquitous pin-ups. Like in the movies, each image is a concentrate of the qualities it embodies. The woman-as-a-homemaker image is replete with all the symbols which dominate the middle class mind. For instance, a 1969 poster has an attractive woman sitting in front of a mirror, dressed the way Sharmila Tagore or Mumtaz did. The dressing table is covered with jewellery and cosmetics, signifying her married status. In the background there is a TV, a radio and furniture. They have even shown a two-wheeler outside the door. "Here you have all items usually given in dowry and semiotically, it is a short step from this to product advertising," says Uberoi. In the Mother-Goddess section, predictably, there are pictures
of Yashoda and Krishna at play. There is even one of an oriental Madonna, in flowing golden robes, holding a rosy baby. Another titled Mamta, 1978, is a marblesque rendering of a mother cradling a plump child. The monotone effect is ruptured by tinges of pink and blue on her nails, lips and blouse. "The decorative halo around the mother suggests her deification through motherhood," says Patricia. Also the taboo of absolute nudity is circumvented if the woman is shown as a mother as in Ma, 1966. This poster depicts a classic, sculpture-like figure of a nude woman nursing a plump male child with Ma written in striking gold and red letters. The artist has given the nude figures a stone-like texture to evade the censors and the valourisation of motherhood lets him get away with the nudity. A woman is also a symbol of fertility and prosperity. Hanging besides posters of Lakshmi are the Green Revolution-inspired calendars. A bountiful buxom village belle, with a scythe in hand, is the focus of the picture as the
ultimate commodity. And behind her there are tractors, tube wells, harvested grains, Nehruvian dams, electricity -- symbols of plenitude. "This objectification of a woman's body is most obvious in the sensual pictures where her body is made available to the male gaze as an object of visual appropriation," says Uberoi. In the more theatrical calendars, woman is shown as the seductress. Titled Angoor Ki Beti, a poster shows the clock striking 10, a glass of wine, black grapes and a painted-pouty woman sprawled in a pose of availability. A composition inspired by the vamps played by Helen and Bindu in the '60s and '70s. Another popular poster, in print for more than 20 years, has two girls in a green-sequinned bikini, inside a wine glass. "A rather lesbian theme, which has led some interpreters to suggest that two scantily-dressed women have a better chance of escaping censors than a man and a woman together," says Patricia. Women also span the entire gamut from goddess to war hero. During the Pakistan war,
a lot of calendars portrayed Durga as Mother India. One calendar also had Indira Gandhi taking over Durga's role with Pakistani tanks, ships and airplanes in various stages of destruction in the background. Though the exhibition is limited by its subject, these pop calendars have something for everybody. While Uberoi doesn't have estimates for its size, she believes that it is a very well-organised industry which started in the 1920s -- when Raja Ravi Verma's begums caught the popular imagination. When poster printing techniques advanced most people thought that calendar art would die but the '80s saw a strong revival. Posters of Arun Govil and Deepika as Ram and Sita showed that this art survived by updating its icons -- this time borrowing from popular television serials. Mass produced in Sivakasi, the countrywide distributors keep a finger on market trends. For instance, says Uberoi, it is not uncommon to find the same background enduring over the years. The only change is in the reigning screen
goddess. And then why tamper with something that evokes love, lust and piety -- all at the same time.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
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