A Dash of Hope in the City of Art

by Ayushree Nandan (India)

Making a local connection India

Mrs Kadam mixed a teaspoon of sugar in the boiling pan of tea placed right in front of her gas stove in fuschia. As I observed this unusual combination, I was amused to encounter a piece of equipment which is usually associated with burning flames painted in an interesting shade of pink. I looked around the one roomed-house situated in a busy community of Dapodi in Pune, India where Mrs Kadam lives with one of her sons and husband and pays 35 rupees to clear the monthly rent. The walls were enveloped in the darkest of pink as the front door complemented them by showcasing several shades of blue. “This wall is made of mud”, said Mrs Kadam pointing at the edges. “Our family has been living here for the past 20 years. We have the house painted in different colours because we like it this way. The colours make it look vibrant and hides those parts of the walls that have been ruined by the rains and water system. We paint these walls on our own and along with that we also paint the doors and a lot many other things found in the house. It just makes everything look lively”, she added. Responding to the query of not choosing bland colours like off-white or a lighter version of pink and yellow usually found in urban buildings of India, she said, “That is too boring. The darker shades make our house look more beautiful.” As I walked out of her residence, I found a similar pattern of buildings and doors painted in darker shades of blue, pink, teal, sea green, orange, purple, and yellow across the community. “Everyone paints their own houses and shops here”, said Mrs Kamble, another resident of the community. “We like the darker shades of the colour and we paint every part of the walls in different colours because it looks beautiful to look at”, she added as she showed the shelves of her walls coloured in darker shades of green in contrary to the outer area of her residence painted in indigo and aqua colours. The interesting culture of painting buildings and objects in a variety of colours seemed to house a billion voices of Dapodi that move towards the beginning of a trend that has been subconsciously created in their lives. This ‘paint culture’, however, is not rooted in Dapodi alone but has been found signifying spirits of vibrancy across several communities in India, out of which most of them are low-income. I have travelled to 7 clusters of communities in Pune alone that resort to painting residents, shops, and sometimes even vehicles. The residents of the communities like what the spirit of the colours has to offer. As many communities in Pune like Bopodi, Dapodi, Dapodi village, Khadki Bazaar, Yerwada, Peth Area, and Hadapsar Area are resolving the issues emerging from cleanliness and hygiene by painting their properties in various skies and rainbows, the long acquired culture marks a subconscious collective effort of commencing positive urbanism. The life that the colours add to every element of the communities is everything that forms its premises on the very heart of positivity. The pattern has been found symbolic of growth, happiness, and confidence, in many slum-based and low-income communities of Pune. This impactful concept validates for a number of households and enterprises the joy the colours entail and has been rooted in their communal culture forever and a day. I am at loss of words number every time I look at the vibrant envelope of resilience immersed in the towns that I travel to. At one of the sunsets in Khadki Bazar in Pune when I stepped on the stones bordered with crooked walls, and doors that had been left ajar, I saw a wave infused with unusual patterns of an unidentified rainbow, that ran over the streets paving stepping stones for vibrant urbanism in the town.