Pop-culture Cartoon Figures Question Ethics, Power, Social Mores in a Stylised Exaggeration

Whether or not a wildlife safari can be ethical is a new discourse in the public domain that has been doing the rounds for at least a year now. Last year, in November, the Supreme Court limited tiger safaris to non-forest land and also banned night tourism, aiming to reverse large-scale ecological damage done inside the tiger reserves. 

The contemporary artist Suryakant Lokhande has a unique way to contribute to the same discourse - by blending the pop-culture cartoon imageries with painterly realism that functions as cultural masks, and highlights the underlying conversation. 

Currently on display at Mumbai's Institute of Contemporary Indian Art (ICIA), the high-gloss oil painting, as part of the multiple paintings under the exhibition, depicts a group of figures - Donald Ducks -  engaged in not just exploration but documenting the nature and the wildlife through binoculars, cameras, and field guides - a common sight in the wildlife safaris.

Lokhande agrees to the underlying idea and the perception being drawn from it, and says, "The work reflects the contradiction between our love for nature and our urge to consume it." Adding to it, he says, "Safaris become spectacles, and wildlife becomes content. That tension between care and disturbance is central to the piece."

Similarly, in 'The Treasure Chest', there are group of animated figures that gather around an open container of abundance, reflecting on collective memory, inheritance, and the communal nature of wealth. Focused on participation, sharing the wealth, and the take on social divide peaks from the vibrancy resulting from colours. 

Mounting another cartoon figure to a horse to depict the classical battle painting, the artist adopts the visual codes of historical propaganda and inserts elements of popular imagery to define how authority is manufactured through spectacle and power is treated not as a historical fact, but as a constructed image, shaped by repetition, pose, and narrative control.

"We question brands and power structures, yet we continue to depend on them. My work tries to show this uneasy balance between resistance and submission," says the advertising personnel-turned-artist, who, in his other work, shows the dependence on the brands.

Samuel Barclay's trope

The paintings move from comedy to tragedy, much like Samuel Beckett's 'Waiting for Godot', where two characters wait endlessly for meaning, for direction, for someone who never arrives. While the Irish playwright shows the waiting as absurd, repetitive, and painfully familiar, Lokhande adds a layer to it. Like Beckett’s depiction, the existential tones are underlined beneath the visual maximalism.

However, the artist believes that no questions are raised through the artworks, rather holds up a mirror—bright, polished, and uncomfortable. Lokhande is also averse to the idea that such reflections through art can change the systems. "Art cannot change systems directly, but it can disturb comfort. If it makes people pause, laugh uneasily, or recognise themselves in it, then it has already begun a social conversation," he who idolises Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein says.

Contrary to contemporary times

As much as the surfaces are glossy, owing to the artist's work with industrial and synthetic materials such as enamel and layered surfaces, it is these pop-culture figures that, even as they smile, pose, and perform, appear unsettling owing to the questions they raise.

Lokhande believes that the pop-culture icons work like a common language and hence are instantly recognisable. "It helps draw the viewer in. I use them to reflect how deeply brands and fictional characters have entered our emotional and social lives," says the artist.

Growing up in a middle-class household in Mumbai, where art was not formally practised, the cartoon figures he has painted were once part of his childhood. "Through the act of painting, my relationship with them has shifted from emotional attachment to critical distance. They now function as tools for
reflection rather than objects of nostalgia," he says.

However, Lokhande’s use of pop-culture props comes at a time when artists across domains - from music and visual arts to the performing arts - are refraining from popular styles in order to stand out. Other factors like personalisation and forging a unique style have dominated the creative industries for a long time now. 

At such a time, Suryakant Lokhande wants to reiterate that "pop culture is not separate from serious art". Talking to Local Samosa, he opines, "It is one of today’s strongest visual realities. Our perception needs to expand beyond 'high' and 'low' culture and accept that meaning can emerge from both."

Perhaps that is the reason Lokhande uses familiar imagery "to speak about unfamiliar discomfort", as he says. Instead of rejecting pop culture, he enters it and twists it, using its shine and humour to expose deeper anxieties and contradictions. 

The exhibition is on display from February 9 to 14 at the Institute of Contemporary Indian Art (ICIA).