Page 497 - Art and Crafts of Bangladesh

494 ART AND CRAFTS

co-workers came to Dhaka in 1964 and they pioneered the use of fluorescent colors in
Dhaka. Subhash Chakrabarty, on the other hand, holds that in the first half of the 70s
(1974?), he along with his co-workers the first to use these colors.
In order to paint banners, the canvas needs to be prepared exactly like canvas for oil
painting. In the past, hessian was used as canvas. Later thick marking fabric came into
use. However, in our current survey we saw that a synthetic tetron-type fabric is used
nowadays in the Dhaka-based workshops (however, marking fabric is still used as
canvas in Syedpur). To prepare the canvas the fabric has to be fixed to the frame and
several coatings applied. Epicon, binder, zinc oxide and water is mixed together to
make the solution for the coating. Drawing starts after the canvas is ready.
Usually cinema banner painters get contracts from distributors of films or
occasionally, directly from the proprietors of cinema halls. They provide the painters
with several posters of the film for which the banner will be prepared to be used as
source material. The painters choose some characters from the posters according to
their own will and work using their distinctive method of composition. Sometimes
they use the lettering used in the posters and sometimes they apply their own lettering.
They use the graph system when painting a big banner from a small poster. The graph
is drawn on the posters with a pen and powder color/oxide and thread are used to draw
the graph on the canvas.
When the graph is complete someone does the drawing in pencil. Usually apprentices
do the drawing under the supervision of their master. After the drawing is done, the
master starts to work with colors. After the painting is finished it is followed by
lettering. But often lettering is done right after drawing and the rest of the painting is
done later. According to senior cinema banner painters, previously they got 3-4 days to
finish a job but nowadays they have to submit their work within one to two days. Thus,
the quality of the work is not as good as it used to be, according to those involved. It
is noteworthy that there is information that in the 60s and later, huge cinema banners
fig. 11.4 Cinema banner, were made by spraying and using paper collage (the banner of Jharer Pakhi directed
36
Syedpur, photograph by Khan Ataur Rahman was executed in the paper collage medium). A variety of
Athahar Hossain Surjo materials like sequins, buttons and cotton are also known to have been used.
The golden age of cinema banner painting
was primarily from the 50s to the first half
of the 80s. It started declining from the end
of the 80s. The main reason for this decline
is the general deterioration of the film
industry as a whole and secondly, the
increasing importance of other media of
publicity, like posters and television. At
present the digital prints used as cinema
banners have become a major threat to the
cinema banner painters. Thirdly, earning
enough for a livelihood is becoming more