Put some colour in the prophet’s life

Mumbai-based artist, Sujaya Batra’s adult colouring book is an adaptation of Kahlil Gibran’s classic The Prophet. She speaks about her connection with the book and more.

Now add some colours to Khalil Gibran’s sublime work The Prophet as artist Sujaya Batra illustrates the words in her new adult colouring book. In her book, The Mystical World, the textile designer and commercial artist reinterprets Gibran’s words and illustrates them through her art. Elaborating on why she chose this book in particular, Sujaya says, “I was 16 when I first read the book and the depth of his wisdom struck a deep chord in my young heart.” The Prophet, originally published in 1923, is a book of 26 prose poetry essays written in English by the Lebanese artist, philosopher and writer Kahlil Gibran. Over the years, the book has been translated into over 40 languages and has never been out of print.

Carrying the learning that a 16-year-old could understand, she repeatedly looked back at the book on various occasions in her life. “Countless are the occasions when I have turned to The Prophet when I needed answers to difficult situations, or just needed the soothing balm of his simple philosophy,” she adds.

Speaking about her creative process, she says her style quite naturally makes for a colouring book. “I love pen and pencil drawings and therefore, they are mostly black and white in colour. Initially I was working on it for a calendar, but when I showed a few of my sketches to a publisher friend, she spread the word and all of a sudden I found myself working on an adult colouring book,” she reveals.

In the beginning the idea of adapting the book was quite a “daunting proposition”, she says. “But that’s where my training as a commercial artist came of help. We were taught to visualise,” says the alumna of Sophia Polytechnic. “For example, in a chapter on marriage, it’s written, ‘oak and Cyprus cannot live in each other’s shadow’. So I drew the trees upside down and since in the book the author is talking about marriage, I made their roots twine up together; to add conflict I added a snake. A lot of my references are from symbols used in Chinese and Japanese art,” she explains.

Being a commercial artist, Sujaya thought why not blend her work and the life-long inspiration the book has been for her. “Drawing is my way of meditating, so it was inevitable that the verses that have been my guide throughout my life, and the hobby that calms my mind, would eventually come together. Making drawings that interpret select verses started as an exercise to delve into my own creative visualisation with the help of the verses. When a friend suggested that these would make a colouring book with a difference, the idea of this book was born.” Sujata is also a qualified T’ai Chi instructor. She did a course in the same during her days in London and that also got her interested in Taoist, Zen and Buddhist philosophies.

She emphasises that this book is apt for the youth in today’s era, “Today’s young adults find themselves in a world that is fast-paced, competitive and ever-changing. Earlier, my husband would work with fax machines, which was the fastest way of communication. But today, my son, who is 29, is a click away from work. I believe the youth will be able to decompress through colouring my drawings and also introspect as they do it. As for me, this book is my tribute to The Prophet and the wisdom it offers.”