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Hello! + Satyajit Ray's work

Hello y'all! This is my first post here. A little intro -- I'm Jigyasa! An intern here at LOCAL, and currently in my final year of design studies! I joined in on this forum because I feel like there is a lack of discourse about what Indian graphic design really means. In a larger sense too, I feel that education in graphic design tends to be euro-centric, or anglo-centric. There is a DEFINITE lack of BIPOC voices in the discipline of design itself. So, I am really glad that a space like this exists. (Also, I love having conversations about this topic so please feel free to hit me up if you'd like to also rant/talk/vent!) Also, I was looking at some inspiration for a recent project at school and found out that, Satyajit Ray was high-key an amazing graphic designer??!!! Just have a look at some of the film posters/book covers he made:

Here's also a good article that AIGA did about him in 2019. Also by homegrown. Does anyone have any other leads/sources of Indian designers/artists they really like? Would love to know!

2 comments

2 Comments

Sourav Roy

Apr 13, 2021

Hey @Jigyasa Tuli. Late to the party, but sometime last year, I too got obsessed with Ray's work as a graphic designer. Although I've grown up devouring his Bengali fiction, only much later did I realise that the pen & ink illustrations in these books were made by Ray himself.

After some intense scouring online I started compiling a pinterest board of all the book jackets, magazine covers, film posters, etc that Ray designed. Feel free to keep adding to it, everyone.

However, this book by Debashish Deb has a detailed breakdown and analysis of his graphic work, complete with coloured photographs. It's divided into 4 parts: book jackets, illustration, typography, and film collaterals. The book is written in Bengali but I would be more than happy to share pages from it here. A lot of the work discussed in the book is not even on the internet. There is another book by Jayanti Sen but it's hella expensive. There's also The Pather Panchali Sketchbook that has the original storyboards and sketches that Ray drew for the film. The book is no longer in stock on Amazon, but I have a copy and would be glad to share photos.

These aside, older Calcutta households and libraries still have original copies of Ray's books and Sandesh editions (with covers designed by him). I can only hope that these physical copies are carefully gathered and archived for posterity by people with the resources to do so.

Here are some more cool old book jackets from India that I stumbled upon while looking for Ray's work:

Apr 22, 2021

Replying to

This is so interesting guys, last month I was in Jaisalmer and learnt a fun fact that the city gets focused tourism from Bengali fans because it was the inspiration behind Ray’s book Sonar Killa. So fascinating how he can influence tourism in Rajasthan so many years after his death.