‘Oscars of the Comic world’ won by the Illustrator Anand Radhakrishnan
Anand Radhakrishnan, a 32-year-old Mumbai-based Visual illustrator, and artist won the eminent Will Eisner comic industry award lauded for Oscars of the Comic World. The Eisner Awards are held annually with prestigious awards won by eminent personalities. This time amongst the list is Mr. Radhakrishnan who has been recognized as the Best Painter/ Multimedia Artist. Radhakrishnan imparts the honor with UK-based colorist John Pearson. They won for their work on UK-based creator Ram V’s 145-page realistic novel Blue In Green, distributed in October 2020 by Image Comics.
Sharing his experience on the collaboration and projects in the light he said “Ram and I have been long-term collaborators, having worked on other projects together. Our careers kickstarted around the same time. I had done the cover for his first self-published book called ‘Black Mumba‘. After that, we did another book called ‘Grafity’s Wall‘, which was based in Bombay. Both of our projects tend to focus around music,”
The illustrations in ‘Blue In Green‘ have explored “the pursuit of excellence”. “The protagonist thinks of himself as a failed musician. It is a devil-at-the-crossroad story where you need to quit a trace of something to have the option to accomplish greater things. And you have to give up to achieve greater things, which might turn into something horrific. In this book, there are also supernatural elements attached.” remarked Radhakrishnan.
Validating his honor for Eisner he mentions that “I work from home and very few people get to see what I do. But when Eisner acknowledges you, you realize that people are looking at your work. It’s made me feel that what I do has meaning.”
Radhakrishnan noted his view on graphic novels by mentioning “I strongly believe that if there is a consolidated effort to push graphic novels, they have the potential to become as big in India as Manga is in Japan,” Radhakrishnan says.
The Mahim resident is presently chipping in at another realistic novel, Radio Apocalypse, along with Ram V. It is the story of a radio broadcast and team that have survived the apocalypse. The book is set to release in October.
Being questioned about pandemic and its effects on his creativity Radhakrishnan positively answered saying that that he didn’t modify his work mode in Pandemic instead he had adapted this process of ‘work from home’ prior to the pandemic “My family, my wife, they know what I do, and they understand the process: how much space and time I need. They have been quite supportive, and not much has changed for me.”
Concluding his note surprisingly Ramakrishnan said that he always aspired to be a doctor but he did have a bent for creativity and imagination. “After my 12th standard, I gave all the tests, but I didn’t get through any of the top schools. Eventually, I decided to do this, thinking I could make a living in something I love doing. It has been a fairly linear journey for me,”
