My editorial from POOL ANNUAL 1

POOL ANNUAL 1 Jacket

The idea to bring out POOL magazine was a very spontaneous one, arising out of a need for something tangible that covered all aspects of design, without boundaries. In India we have been feeding on design icons from the West for a very long time – I thought it was a good idea for us to create our own heroes. After I discussed the idea with some of my friends and peers, I realized the true magnitude of the idea; I would face problems pertaining to finances, time, as well as content. But every skeptical opinion I heard made me look for more ways to make the idea happen.

I figured a conventional business model for the magazine would take too much of my time, and perhaps distract me from running my own design consulting practice (INDI Design). So, I created a new business model, deciding to use the team from my design practice to take the idea of POOL to fruition. POOL gets made in the gaps in our regular work schedule. The availability of content was an issue initially, but with the magazine gaining popularity, we are now in the position where we have content lined up for the next six issues…things are pretty much falling into place.

By the time the 12th issue of POOL was released we had a growing base of subscribers, and the unanimous feedback was that the content was timeless and so relevant to our times. Almost all the new subscribers began to ask for earlier copies that they had missed, and we realized that we had long run out of them! That was when we decided to compile an Annual edition of the first 12 issues of POOL and make them available as part of a book on Contemporary Indian Design.

It was another exciting idea, and we started working on this with our usual enthusiasm. We decided to keep each issue as it was to provide a record of how the magazine had developed. There have been small incremental changes in every issue, and the magazine has indeed come a long way from its first almost tentative splash into the pool of Indian design. When I look at this volume now, I see anew a wealth of young and experienced talent from so many creative fields of design…it makes me very proud to be part of this world.

Design is a relatively new profession in this country, and most of our students are exposed to design only through the writings and work of Western designers. Not everybody has the opportunity to travel and see the world for themselves. In that sense design remains a distant ideology for many designers trained here – so many of our professionals have such esoteric ideas about how design relates to life. POOL is bringing design in India back to life. When we see our own people doing innovative things, we get inspired and motivated. That is the purpose I see POOL fulfilling.

There is another reason for the POOL Annual. Despite the fact that the world is recognizing the growing population and economic strength of India, there is a glaring lack of awareness about the design sector and its contribution to economic growth. This is largely due to the absence of a voice from India in the field of design, a voice that can tell the world that original ideas by Indians are taking their rightful place in the sun. The truth is that economic growth in India is fuelled by the small scale sector of industry that uses far more indigenous and radical ideas than the organized sector does.

Unfortunately, the Indian design industry is as diverse and disorganized as this small scale business sector, and hence proves too difficult for anyone to make sense of. I get compliments from around the world for making the Indian design industry more transparent. This Annual will be a concise way to present Indian design on the world platform.

An effort like this is a huge team effort. POOL’s advisors have been pillars of strength in more ways than one, always listening to me patiently and suggesting simpler and easier ways to get over problems. INDI teams across geographies (Pune, Mumbai, and Riyadh) take special pride in bringing out POOL. They have transformed into a truly dedicated team of good designers committed to furthering the scope of the magazine. Their enthusiasm and animated discussions on design and work makes working on POOL an extremely enjoyable task. Designindia, the online forum, has also been a constant source of inspiration, allowing us to keep a finger on the pulse of
Indian design.

My first debt is to my parents and my teachers (gurus) who showed so much faith in this idea that we started believing in it too. I hope you, as a loyal POOL reader, believe in it too!

INDI Design team with the POOL ANNUAL 1

Christopher Hogan and Beres in Pune

Artist Christopher Hogan in Pune

Australian Artist Christopher Hogan was in Pune with his wife Beres to conduct few art workshops at a company in Pune. We had time to visit the famous Kelkar Museum together. I love visiting museums with artists from different cultures, I learn so much every time. Christopher will be back to India next year on a longer program me and we hope we can work out a few plans together that we are thinking off. In the meanwhile i love this picture of Beres standing next to the Pulsar Photo collage that we created for Bajaj..her hair sort of go with the wild energy in the picture.

Christopher posed with old statues from Ganapati festival in the Pune street.

Must see his website and blog. I like his bold colors and prints that he uses.

Beres at Bajaj Corporate Display

Long time

i haven’t been putting anything here for a longtime..but i intend to catch up. So much has happened and with such speed. I was in Turkey again and also visited Izmir, then i was in Einhoven for Dutch Design Awards Jury…and then i was in Riyadh, started INDI-Riyadh…also tons of work happening in office..POOL is out with 18th issue..POOL BOOK goes in Print today…new office is all packed with bubbling enthusiastic team..i will try and post a few things and pictures on each of these..life is changing for sure..:)

LISTEN

Anette, Sudhir and Cagri at INDI Design

As humans we have very limited ways to input information to us. Basically we hear, talk, see, feel, taste and smell and through these five senses we process the inputs into various feelings, thoughts, likes, dislikes and emotions. These five senses are our interfaces for interaction with the world through our lives. Now not how well do these senses function but how you process them defines who you are. The processing is dependent on our geography, culture, education and various other contexts.

I believe that brands need to emulate these five input senses and then use a higher processing to create a unique identity. Not just commercial brands, but political and social brands need to emulate these as well. Any company which has a recognized mechanism of hearing, an organized mechanism of speaking to its stakeholders will always be close to them. These lead to what we call a feeling of the pulse of people in the democracy. Citizens or stakeholders will always feel secure when they know whom they can talk to, when they know they will be heard and they will hear back. It indeed is a funny situation when citizens can not see the lead, obviously they wouldn’t know who will hear them or talk to them. In my view Indian government needs just a basic input output processes in place.

Brands do it so well. Brand ambassadors work so well in this context, faceless companies become recognized, you start hearing them. Whenever you can interact with a brand in an intimate manner, it leads to experience. Stakeholders usually are very tolerant towards behaviors as long as interaction is happening. I hope as democracy we in India realize these basic principles of living.

I have introduced a Turkish “Designer on the Road” Cagri in earlier issue. He is going around the world working in various design offices and collecting a huge cultural and professional experience. He is at his second stop in this journey at INDI Design. We intend to follow his journey starting with this issue. We have had Anette Hiltunen  with INDI from SDU, Denmark- helping us put POOL on the iPad.

We are listening, do tell us what you are doing..:)

Interns

Sudhir Sharma with Can, Nikhil, Gorkem and Aceliya, interning at INDI

Design is how it’s practiced, and there is much more to Design besides what we learn in Design schools. Also it’s something that will never have a finish line. That’s what makes Design a different turf altogether.
Most creative education is not complete without an internship module which is more of an industry exposure. We find students getting more and more choosy about where they do internships—obviously big names, big cities and big brands to spend their summers.  This in a way decides their employment potential.

But there are many who see this as an opportunity to discover a new place and new area with the idea of soaking in the vibrancy of a complex design business environment. I have always been inspired by this second lot. I see many students from European and Asian countries coming with very open minds to spend time with us in India. I am also seeing Indian students from Management and other backgrounds wanting to do a stint in Design business. Besides having a team of experts, I always enjoy to have these interns on projects that need insights with a fresh mind. I feel we learn from the interns. They bring their own fresh outlooks, skills and passion. Their spirits infect the regular teams and you find the same team reordering processes to become inclusive. It does add life to passion to have fresh blood in. My office is home to Interns from Turkey, Denmark, UK and India this season. We seem to be having a goodtime with spicy Indian food, movies like “Delhi Belly”, meditation and of course work.

Real Design is after all pure adrenaline.

Check blog of  Interns from Turkey

Love Locks !!!

Recently at a park in Kiev i noticed that hand rails on a walk bridge was laden with these locks, apparantly couples buy lock, paint their name, lock it on the rail and throw away the keys..:) sweet…

Millions of them, they obviously weigh on the bridge, so the local government has to cut them once in a while and cart them away…and that makes space for the new ones…

How do these trends start…can u consciously start something like this..In India i have seen trees around which people tie scarfs. clothes, then wells in which people throw coins..i have seen a temple in which passerbys leave bottles of Alcohol…

Have you seen…photographed these trends.. share them..

Love locks in Kiev picture by Sudhir Sharma

Love Locked in Kiev- picture by Sudhir Sharma

Love locked in Kiev- picture by Sudhir Sharma

Remember Chernobyl!

Oleg Veklenko

On my recent visit to Ukraine, I travelled to Kharkiv to meet up Oleg Veklenko.

Brenda from ICOGRADA had connected me to him earlier and i was fascinated by the thought and energy that a small community of Designers have built up as “4th Block”. 4th BLOCK organises a graphic triennial of International Ecoposters, every three years since 1991. The name of this festival came Nuclear tank that burst in Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant. The first exhibition took place five years after Chernobyl catastophe and immediately attracted the attention of artists and designers from all over the world.

I spent the day walking with Oleg through the academy of Art and Design, meeting up other designers from the Graphic design Association in Kharkiv and visiting design studios. Oleg had kept a surprise for me. Just the week before the exhibition 25 on 25 -International commemorative poster action by 25 world-renowned designers, in memory of the 25 year anniver- sary of the Chernobyl disaster, had concluded in a gallery, But he kept the exhibition on for me to see !!!

I was touched by this extremely profound gesture. I have brought back the Posters with me and i promised to have them exhibited in Indian Cities.

Oleg Veklenko with Vladimir Bondarenkor

Oleg now and in Chernobyl 25 years back - Picture by Sudhir Sharma

Oleg was a young army officer when the tragedy happened, he showed me his picture holding the flag at the site, and he took to graphic design soon after to spread the message in an unprecendent way. You dont find many examples of such commitment and passion in our world.  I had a very nice and warm reception with the designers, and i will be featuring their work in POOL in coming months. I feel designers should try and visit places where such great ideas emerge, it is inspiring. The Kharkiv academy of Art and Design is fabulous with great work and some great teachers, I think it is a hidden gem. I wish the teaching was in english, I am sure like Ukrainian education in Medicine, Design could be another educational export from Ukraine for the merging worlds.

About the exhibition from their catalogue:

International commemorative poster action “25 on 25” by 25 world-renowned designers, in memory of the 25 year anniver- sary of the Chernobyl disaster.

April 26, 2011 has marked a 25 year milestone of the Chernobyl power plant explosion at reactor number 4, which released a radioactive cloud that caused an unprecedented ecological disaster that not only destroyed lives and livelihoods of those, who were directly in its shadow, but also those born much-much later. This global environmental catastrophe had taught human- ity a lot, it brought about many positive changes in our society, in political views, in science and culture.

Chernobyl remains to be an important historical event that, even today, influences international energy development strategies, and affects scientific assessments when it comes to protection of human health and safeguarding the environment. It, unfortu- nately, gained an even greater historical significance now, after a terrible accident at the Fukushima 1 nuclear power plant in Japan.

To commemorate the 25 year anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster, graphic designers association “The 4th Block”, with the support of Ukraine’s National Academy of Arts, and other orga- nizations, is launching a poster action called “25 on 25”. Artists, invited to participate in this event are exceptional individuals, highly celebrated among international designers community.

Poster action “25 on 25” is a tribute to those who risked their lives and their wellbeing to protect the world from the nuclear horrors of Chernobyl. Broadening our understanding of modern disasters, this campaign continues, thought artistic means, the efforts of the liquidators at Chernobyl, who battled the aftermath of the accident, and it hopes to help prevent future disasters. The world should be safer and more beautiful.

Remember Chernobyl!

25 on 25 exhibition

Some more celebrity designers from kharkiv

4th Block Designers at Kharkiv

 

Ukraine discovered !!

Ukraine embassy rejected my request for Visa twice on face and two times with the travel agent, before i finally got it. Rejection was more technical than anything, some paper missing, original copy not in hand etc..and i heard rumors like Ukrainians dont want Indians to come to their country..(Visa is very strict for Indians, pakistan and Bangladesh)…some friends also figured the reason..Ukraine has more females then males…they are white and beautiful and like brown skin…but government doesn’t want the colour to dilute..so the restrictions.

truth is something else…Ukaraine loves India…so much so that many people follow Indian spiritual gurus, they love Indian textiles, Indian food and are not colour conscious. The visa is restricted for another reason- after USSR broke up- ukraine became a porus route for Indians to enter Europe, the EU took strong objection and hence the extremely burly attitude for Indians seeking Visa. Ukrainians have tough time getting Visa for EU.

Ukraine is right there almost a part of Europe, but poorer, so for me it is a curious mix of europian work ethics at Indian prices..:).

I spent ten days in Kiev ( a day in Harkiv) and amazed by the warmth of this cold place.

A bit about Design India

I started Designindia yahoo group (http://in.groups.yahoo.com/group/designindia/) in September 2002, nearly ten years back as a way to connect professional designers to each other.

In these ten years the Designindia Yahoogroup has remained a close group, in the sense each and every member is screened and then allowed to join in. This has greatly protected the quality of discussions that happen on this group. I reject as many requests to join as i allow, because of the lack of information people provide about themselves.

Practicing designers, people related to design education (not students), design industry and design journalism and sometimes a few exceptions are on this group.

Most members have always responded to calls of various kinds, we have jobs being advertised, requests for help and collaborations, information and knowledge being attended to. It has become a community and a social network even before the term social network came into being. The group has debated design education, clients, social issues, community, design organisations, people and various events.

1st offline meeting of Designindia in Lonavla September 2003

Looking back i find that the group was instrumental in discussing draft Design Policy that was lobbied and released, designindia was instrumental in transforming national Design Summits, It was helpful for Uday to organize “Design for India” in New York. Designindia actively participated in exhibitions in Korea and then in China.

Innumerable publications in India and abroad have picked up issues from this forum and featured people from this forum. POOL (www.poolmagazine.in) is a magazine that is an outcome from this forum.

Designindia encourages positive action to take design in India ahead. It has become our google and our newspaper.

I have been thinking, asking seeking advice on to where can Designindia go next? and seems like i have an answer with the help of a few of you, you would soon see the new Designindia that takes our exchange, activism, collaboration and voice to the next level.

It has taken more time than i thought it would, as you know no one runs

Designindia, it runs itself…and i do have routine compulsions of earning like a professional designer as well. But it is shaping well and i just cant wait to put it out for you.

2nd DEsignindia Offline meeting february 2005

Designindia remains free and voluntry, it remains headless and without control. (ofcourse i do control a few bits here and there)

Here is a new offering for you:

I am requesting members who have there Blogs / Websites / Events / Organisations and other groups to use- display Designindia identity on their websites/blogs/promotions, as a common identity. The file with the identity is being uploaded on yahoo group. You have to be a Designindia Yahoogroup member to use the identity.

http://in.groups.yahoo.com/group/designindia/files/Designindia%20logo.zip

Do also recommend your batchmates, other designers to join the Designindia Yahoo group, you may join and also ask other enthusiasts to join Yahoo group on Linkedin, facebook and core 77.

Designindia Linkedin memberships will go beyond the Yahoogroup memberships and I urge all of you to join Linkedin for the quality of network information that you can get there.

If you do use Designindia Identity – please mail a link back to me so i can prepare one list of all and promote that further.

Uday organised "Design with India" New York

You are welcome to promote your issues, blogs, websites, requirements, products and services on this forum (but be sensitive to who the members are), will be great if you can promote Designindia link as well.

The use of Designindia identity does not mean that all members of Designindia endorse or agree with your views or issues. It will just mean that these issues are discussed here as well.

expecting good results

regards

Sudhir Sharma

DESIGNINDIA

2nd Coming…

I am writing this note from Bellagio, Italy where I am attending a workshop on Design Anthropology, Indigenous Knowledge, and Culture-Based Innovation, with sixteen design anthropologists, Indigenous knowledge experts, and
industry innovation consultants participating with representation from
Denmark, Mexico, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Ethiopia, Zimbabwe,
China, Japan, Korea, Lebanon, India, Canada and the United States.

What struck me at this meeting as different from other such conferences and workshops is that very learned phd and masters, intellectually decorated people spoke to speak from the heart. I have seen too many meetings and discussions which become a show down of terms and knowledge rather than what people feel with all those accomplishments. We designers are emotional lot. We need to think from heart and stop parading our knowledge as a badge. That knowledge needs to transform us and anything we do into a better piece. So many people around the world are realising the power of design and want to use it for social good.

In this issue we have an article from Anna Muoio of Continuum of a project that they worked on in India. Incidentally Anna  coordinated the last workshop that I attended in Bellagio in 2008. So that’s another great side effect of these meetings, you network and make friends which continue the dialogue.
In a way that’s what we want to do with POOL.

Do get in touch with ideas, do let us know what excites you…whatever warms your heart as a designer, or artist or innovator.