Made this artwork for Close, Too Close: Tranquebar Book of Queer Erotica, the first South Asian anthology of its sort. This piece is being used as the end papers and I named it Ark Erotica. I like it when the editors refer to this piece as the following: "Anirban Ghosh starts off the book by taking us cruising through the endpapers in 'Ark Erotica'".Do follow the Facebook Page and spread the word if you like this: https://www.facebook.com/closetooclose

The full interview: Read on...

 

Fish and fetish? Could you explain that? 
Fish and Fetish is nothing but a fictional restaurant and catering agency started by a fish loving gay entrepreneur. Being a Bengali myself, I love the machhli and on Ark Erotica it is only fair that good food is served. As far as fetish is concerned it could be a good strategy for creating a relevant brand identity.

Ark Erotica takes cruising various members of the LGBTQ community and tries to be as inclusive as possible. The top left section has an artist whose gender-identity is ambiguous. The subject of his/her painting is a gigantic posterior of an individual: the idea is to give an impression in a humourous way of offscreen space where the first bit illustration ends and the stories in the book unfold. Then there are men and women indulging in a romantic group activity, some of them could be identified as men, some women, some transgender while some could be popular mythological and comic characters.

The mermaids are a couple: one with black curly locks wears a large bindi on her forehead while the other is a blonde. They are romantic and naughty too! Then there is the captain who appears to be mighty pleased and accepting, enjoying the sea breeze. I also wanted to challenge the stereotype of “young and fit” individuals becoming representatives of sex and romance. There are these two senior gay men too on board who are in love and are having a great time.   

How long did the actual process of drawing take? 
I took me around five days to make a few rough sketches and put the whole thing together. I wouldn’t work on the whole illustration all together but brainstorm and review the work-in-progress: the pre-production took longer as usual than the actual execution.

Where do you hope this book ends up in the larger context of the LGBTQ space in India?
As much as it is important to talk about violence and discrimination that members of the Queer community face regularly, it is also necessary to celebrate our sexuality and express it through the creative medium. I pray this anthology pervades every prejudiced mind and initiates a debate. The politics of invisibilizing sexuality either by repression or mockery has to end and this will only happen if we start having a dialogue with people and power structures around us. And guess what? It has begun already with Close, Too Close. Bon Voyage!