An engineering dropout, Santanu Hazarika, a doodle artist and an illustrator delves into the deep recesses of his consciousness and creates profound art forms. Crowned with the Best Doodle Artist in the 2014 Red Bull Doodle Art Competition which was held amongst 32000 doodle artists from across the globe, Hazarika since then is flying with his imaginations and is producing stunning pieces of art works depicting various aspects of our very existence.
Guncha Arora writes about this pride of Assam who says that his works have enormous impact of the Hindu Philosophy which helps him transport into a sublime state from where his creativity emerges
Throw your hat into the ring and sculpt your imagination into reality. That’s exactly what Santanu Hazarika, a small town boy from Guwahati did and look how he soars today! With a small dream, immense patience and keeping his roots firmly grounded in his scribbles, here is the story of Santanu, a lad who never gave up dreaming and one who never stopped penning those dreams down.
What happens when Hindu mythology and the pen collide? When imagination runs wild, wild scribbles emerge portraying aspects of life that may be highly cumbersome to understand but transcend you into a time of virtual reality which you can’t get out of. His escapades were his scribbles and he never looked back. Doodle Art 2014 came as the fairy dust in his life that was just waiting to sprinkle some magic into his life. Once he conquered the throne, he relished the thrill of spreading his wings and zooming into the world of creating more such doodles that were a symbol of what he believed in- Metaphoric symbols and psychedelia.
Santanu is currently working for RedBull, Austria and having done independent projects for Harper’s, Red Bull, Aaromya tea, Utsah, Metropolis Asia, Mojarto(NDTV), he has also added another laurel in his hatchet- working for the Ministry of Culture, India. The reigning Doodle Art champion has reframed the tiger into a tamed cat and has been able to conquer the world with just fragments of his imagination on paper. Winning the world doodle art championship pocketed him his first corporate contract as a designer where he also designed a limited edition RBDA t-shirt which was up for sale in Red Bull store.What’s more? He also has his own independent online apparel store called Dilate Ink which has some crazy designs been scribbled on them and to the people who are in awe and reverence of him, hold up! He also travels the world conducting workshops so you could just sign up for this. We can safely say, the Guwahati boy finally got his wings!
Doodle Art is back! Announce to the world your desires to be an artist who rebels against reality and oozes out creativity. Now is your chance to transform into the next Santanu Hazarika. Want stardom? You have to doodle for it! With your doodle being showcased at one of the best exotic locations in the world the one with the most imaginative scribble is in for a surprise. Out of all 40 participating countries the winners will be invited to a Global Gallery where their doodle will be put up as VIRTUAL REALITY! So wait no more. Log on to doodleart.redbull.com for more details. Get, set, Doodle!
Resolving to use his superpowers for good, Santanu entered the ring with Symbolism as the key element as seen in the Hindu calendar to construct a fragment of his imagination to virtual life. He has been instrumental in creating the logo and creatives, the templates and the key visuals for this years’ RedBull Doodle Art and we can say he has done an exceptional job at it. Just as he experiments, he wants the upcoming doodle artists to imbibe the trait of experimenting and starting from a void to create a space full of creativity keeping the individual spirit intact. Santanu also denotes the marketing mechanism and its importance on social media for the motivation and zeal needed to be able to curate a newer piece of art that would leave people gaping at it for hours. For the warm fuzzy feeling one gets as the number of likes go up on social media, one needs to keep as connect with the inside world and the outside world as well by penning down some crazy fragments of imagination and putting up the surreal images on social media and also collaborate with fellow artists. It’s all a learning experience that bears fruit extremely sweet.
For someone who had a dream, the accomplishment of it is surreal. Cape Town offered him the platform to be in sync with artists from around the globe who ideated their imagination in the Global Gallery. To be able to merge and delve deeper into others’ scribbles was a feat in itself and Santanu is forever grateful for it. Today he is working on his mini art journal that will depict his doodles and concepts of Physics and Meta Physics. Wait with bated breaths also for his upcoming journal on Mahabharata that he is penning down with a mate.
