<p>A film poster of The Dirty Picture without Vidya Balan’s ur...hmmm... staring at us; a poster of Gadar - Ek Prem Katha which contains only Sunny Deol’s handpump; and a poster of Mard without Amitabh Bachchan showing off his ‘mardness’ or even a phool wearing a chaddi - imagination is what you need when enjoying works of art by 22-year old Akshar Pathak. <br /><br />These posters have started to make news with the City’s young and old alike, and why shouldn’t they, for in less than six months since the Delhi-based artist started designing and uploading ‘minimal posters’ of released Hindi films and TV serials on the internet, he has garnered praise from personalities like Punjabi rapper Honey Singh and actor Sanjay Suri. He has also already received an offer from Mira Nair to design a poster for her upcoming film.<br /><br />The posters are simple, funny and convey in essence, well-known dialogues or capture iconic moments from films. A user interface designer and an alumnus of National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) the first poster that Akshar designed was of Hrithik Roshan-Sanjay Dutt starrer Agneepath. The poster bears a graphically designed face of Kancha Cheena, Sanjay Dutt’s character, as the subject. The idea is to capture the entire action with minimum elements.<br /><br />“Bollywood posters are action-packed with photo-manipulated images. There is a heroine providing mystique and sensuality along with the hero looking all tough. I add a minimalistic twist to posters stripping the object down to its bare essentials. Then a handful of colours and shapes convey the basic idea around which the movie was originally made,” Akshar shares with Metrolife.<br /><br />There are posters which bear images of stars too like Anil’s Kapoor’s Mr India. For popular films like Jab We Met and Sholay Akshar has designed more than one poster. Each one of them is unique. Some of them are witty, some subtle, while others like that of Deewar has nothing else except a hand with the words Mera baap chor hai on it. <br />For Munna Bhai MBBS, Akshar found only two elements enough to convey the film’s gist – a carom board and a glass of juice. Gadar’s poster has nothing on it other than a hand pump - perhaps the one that Sunny yanked out! <br /><br />The concept of minimal film posters is getting popular in Hollywood, while it is still new in India. Each poster designed by him is against the growing complexity of the actual poster and the idea that “busier is better. But minimal is being used quite widely now. In fact I even saw a minimal Nepali film poster,” says Akshar, whose mother is an artist and father an architect.<br /><br />Minimal posters have a great impact when the film has released and can be understood by those who have watched the film but can they convey the same meaning as other posters? “No, but they can definitely work as tools of promotion before the film is released. I like to play with the strongest point of the film.” He has also designed posters for TV shows CID and Hum Paanch.<br /><br />Akshar designs posters as a hobby. “I don’t make posters with a commercial intent. Minimalism is an art in itself and when my expression of minimalism was liked by so many, there was no looking back. I will continue to design them,” he sums up. <br /></p>
<p>A film poster of The Dirty Picture without Vidya Balan’s ur...hmmm... staring at us; a poster of Gadar - Ek Prem Katha which contains only Sunny Deol’s handpump; and a poster of Mard without Amitabh Bachchan showing off his ‘mardness’ or even a phool wearing a chaddi - imagination is what you need when enjoying works of art by 22-year old Akshar Pathak. <br /><br />These posters have started to make news with the City’s young and old alike, and why shouldn’t they, for in less than six months since the Delhi-based artist started designing and uploading ‘minimal posters’ of released Hindi films and TV serials on the internet, he has garnered praise from personalities like Punjabi rapper Honey Singh and actor Sanjay Suri. He has also already received an offer from Mira Nair to design a poster for her upcoming film.<br /><br />The posters are simple, funny and convey in essence, well-known dialogues or capture iconic moments from films. A user interface designer and an alumnus of National Institute of Fashion Technology (NIFT) the first poster that Akshar designed was of Hrithik Roshan-Sanjay Dutt starrer Agneepath. The poster bears a graphically designed face of Kancha Cheena, Sanjay Dutt’s character, as the subject. The idea is to capture the entire action with minimum elements.<br /><br />“Bollywood posters are action-packed with photo-manipulated images. There is a heroine providing mystique and sensuality along with the hero looking all tough. I add a minimalistic twist to posters stripping the object down to its bare essentials. Then a handful of colours and shapes convey the basic idea around which the movie was originally made,” Akshar shares with Metrolife.<br /><br />There are posters which bear images of stars too like Anil’s Kapoor’s Mr India. For popular films like Jab We Met and Sholay Akshar has designed more than one poster. Each one of them is unique. Some of them are witty, some subtle, while others like that of Deewar has nothing else except a hand with the words Mera baap chor hai on it. <br />For Munna Bhai MBBS, Akshar found only two elements enough to convey the film’s gist – a carom board and a glass of juice. Gadar’s poster has nothing on it other than a hand pump - perhaps the one that Sunny yanked out! <br /><br />The concept of minimal film posters is getting popular in Hollywood, while it is still new in India. Each poster designed by him is against the growing complexity of the actual poster and the idea that “busier is better. But minimal is being used quite widely now. In fact I even saw a minimal Nepali film poster,” says Akshar, whose mother is an artist and father an architect.<br /><br />Minimal posters have a great impact when the film has released and can be understood by those who have watched the film but can they convey the same meaning as other posters? “No, but they can definitely work as tools of promotion before the film is released. I like to play with the strongest point of the film.” He has also designed posters for TV shows CID and Hum Paanch.<br /><br />Akshar designs posters as a hobby. “I don’t make posters with a commercial intent. Minimalism is an art in itself and when my expression of minimalism was liked by so many, there was no looking back. I will continue to design them,” he sums up. <br /></p>
