Art Direction
I was sitting with directors and filmmakers,
discussing an event of several plays,
each production requiring a visual presence of its own,
when someone proposed yellow. Or perhaps
yellow had already been proposed when I began objecting.
Imagine, I said, the promotional material
for a major event, all in yellow. Every poster,
every design, everything. Can you imagine?
I had something else in mind. Or rather,
something began to take shape as I spoke.
Gulkand red, or gulmohur red...
the distinction between the two still troubling me...
and white cutout designs against it.
Please, no illustrations drawn over the red, I said,
but cutouts. The white taking shape where the red
was interrupted, its edges becoming clearer
as the colour continued around them,
occupying every portion the white did not.
Then an icy blue. Perhaps for another production,
with illustrations composed of white dots,
although dots, when printed too carefully,
begin behaving like separate little objects.
That wasn't it. The ink needed to be pressed,
perhaps smudged a little, the dots spreading
at their edges without losing their dotted character,
the intervals between them growing less definite.
No, don't make each dot so distinct.
Let the pressure of the ink do something to them.
And there was another blue whose name
I cannot now decide upon. Squalid blue?
Or was it cobalt? Squalid...?
Was that even the colour I meant?
Anyway, a blue with white in it.
But the white was not to remain entirely white.
There had to be green within it, the green
of dark, rubbery leaves, a green which seemed
to possess a thickness of its own.
And yet translucent, mind you, translucent—
—not spilt across the white like another colour
printed afterwards, but showing within it.
The green should be visible, yes, but not quite
conceal the white; nor should the white
entirely conceal the green. And the blue?
The blue must still be there, holding
the two within the same design.
And for my own play, I returned to the red.
A white background, first. Then, against it,
the block figure of a dargah, gulkand red,
or gulmohur red, its shape taking up
the white space. And within that red figure,
symbols. No, not symbols superimposed
upon the red, but white cutout designs,
the shapes cut into the figure itself,
their outlines made visible by the red
that remained around them.
Whether to call it gulkand or gulmohur
was another matter.
~ Oizys.
Written for dVerse's Open Link Night and dVerse LIVE! on 22nd October, 2026.
~ Oizys.
Written for dVerse's Open Link Night and dVerse LIVE! on 22nd October, 2026.