Carlos Ramos: "India" painting show

Carlos Ramos, a painter and animator who created Nickelodeon's Chalkzone and worked on Dexter's Laboratory, has a marvelous new show of paintings opening tomorrow evening, August 15, at the Corey Helford Gallery in Culver City, Califoirnia. This majestic new body of work is focused on Indian iconography. All of the paintings are also viewable online. Carlos Ramos: India

• [Anonymous]

  I agre, “Little India”/”The Little Book of Hindu Deities” was awesome. (Im an Indian)
  By the way, Krishna is male, the comic seems to be of a woman. Or am I seeing something wrong in the artistic depiction?

• [Anonymous]

  Er… they are very factually incorrect. I mean, this was OK 10 yrs ago but not now. Krishna is a man, Durga is NOT the Goddess of fire (far from it!).
  The art is very cute, though like mentioned above little India was much better IMHO. And I agree its just the artists interpretation, but really, you cant go about calling Venus the Warrior Goddess can you?

  Dips

• [mellowknees]

  “Bad art” is in the eye of the beholder, I’d say. I would say that the images are highly stylized, but I don’t think they’re over-romanticizing anything. Everyone sees their world through a different perspective, after all. At the very least, it’s an interesting look through the mind’s eye of an artist.

  Though I have to say that Chalkzone sucked.

• [mellowknees]

  Wait – I should have said:

  Chalkzone sucked *in my opinion*.

• [Thad E Ginataom]

  It doesn’t have to be educational in that sense, it just has just not to be (my opinion of course) cute beyond cuteness.

  Frankly, there are designs there that I might buy on a greeting card; they’re pretty. It is not a collection that would get me into a gallery.

• [Sekino]

  I don’t see where it says it’s supposed to be some highly educational essay on historical and religious India. The art is based on Indian iconography. It’s graphic design, not National Geographic.

  Sometimes, artists just want to play with certain colours, textures or themes they find attractive. It doesn’t always have to be deep, dark and meaningful. Thank goodness.

• [Thad E Ginataom]

  I never suggested that it was offensive, I just queried the value of the work as “art”! I’d take issue with descriptions such as “majestic”. This is not Vinayaka on knickers, or anything like that.

  As for Ravi Varma’s ladies, swans, etc… yes; 1950s chocolate boxes!

• [Zuhaib]

  It should be titled, India The Western Stereotype.
  I say that because first it plays on a lot of the west stereotype on India, and 2nd leaves out any reference to the history of Islam in India, which is something the west almost does not understand.
  While their has been issue in the recent past on using Islamic figures in painting, if done tastefully, the past painting has never caused issue to the vast majority.
  The wiki page does a great job at it, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_art

  • [Antinous / Moderator]

    …and 2nd leaves out any reference to the history of Islam in India

    Did you actually follow the link? The Taj Mahal, Shahjahan’s Window and Shahjahanabad are all on Mughal themes.

• [arkizzle / Moderator]

  Wait.. cute beyond cuteness?

  What about Hanuman? Et al..

• [georigin]

  Whoa, i think everybody should calm down! I am Indian and i find no offense in any of these paintings! Carlos’ enchantment with India led him to paint, that’s it!

  And about the whole greeting card thing, what about the malayali artist Raja Ravi Verma’s paintings printed on greeting cards, on vehicles on everything imaginable?

• [Thad E Ginataom]

  Nicely put, mellowknees — although I tend to think that everything I write on the net has a built-in “IMHO”. Remember the Usenet days when leaving out those four letters could lead to a major flaming?

  Zuhaib… again true. Stereotypical India is 100% Hindu, and a rather quaint version of “Hindu” at that. As you point out, nothing could be further from the truth. The other religions and cultures may, indeed, be minorities today, but they are just as much a part of the fabric of India. At least in my city, one does not have to go far to find churches, mosques, etc etc. The art of Islam may not be so obvious down this Southern end of the country, but its presence is assuredly here.

  I can admit that these images are pretty — but even that gives me problems. They are too pretty. Of course there is room to express the beauty of India, and of course it is valid to express the wonder and amazement that it inspires in people (I guess one could be pedantic and say that it is never invalid to express one’s feelings), but this (IMHO, of course) leaves the nitty gritty to far behind.

  By the way… I’m not Indian; I’m a Brit, living, long-term (five years so far), in India. Also I worked for 16 years in a UK greeting card company, mostly in editorial and pre-press.

• [sockpr0n]

  Not quite as interesting but very similar to one of my 5 year old’s favorite books, “Little India”/”The Little Book of Hindu Deities” by Sanjay Patel.

• [Anonymous]

  Dude, dude, dude–come on, dude. You haters are missing the point(s). These paintings capture truths about India, about spirituality, about humanity, about nature and do it in a particular style. The style brings out certain things that other, more realistic, styles might not. This is admittedly not gritty, slice-of-life-in-Calcutta stuff; but it’s HIS vision–HIS India. Want to see yours in paint? Paint it.

• [dave]

  yes, an artist could absolutely paint “Venus the Warrior Goddess,” just as easily as one could put a Hummer emblem on a Honda, or sculpt a dinosaur playing a cello. this is art, not documentary, not reference, not reality.

  animals don’t walk and talk but i’d consider Disney’s “The Jungle Book” to be a great work of art, wouldn’t you?

• [Azadeh]

  I agree with Zuhaib ,although I am Persian these ” paintings ” seem
  like little more than rehashed common images. The ” Fly India ”
  piece is a barely veiled rip off of an Air India advertising poster. A few weeks back you posted the work of another artist Savanna Snow who also had referenced India for her show ” Charming Cobras ” she claimed it to be “an exploration of Vedic text, pattern & the infinity of India. I found her work to be refreshing, it was delightful the way she handled the different faiths & feeling of the country without devaluing it’s culture…

• [Thad E Ginataom]

  “Carlos explores the exotic mysteries and icons of India…”

  … and turns them into over-romanticised cheap greeting card designs.

  Bad art that says little about the country that I live in. It may appeal to some who have a romantic daydream notion of India.

  Thumbs down.

• [Anonymous]

  I think that it’s unfair to label them as “cheap greeting card designs”. Of course, they can’t replace millenia of Indian artwork and I doubt that that’s their aim, they’re just cute, quirky Indian-inspired cartoons. Of course, if you want something deeper, it’s out there..

  James