Advertisement Enamel & Tin Boards
Art365 India
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Advertising, perhaps because of its ubiquity, is usually taken for granted and no serious thought is given to it. But it can be an invaluable tool to study social history. The ads we see around us today will tell future historians about the socio-economic landscape of these times and are a good indicator of evolving mores.
Advertisements tell us a thousand stories about India at different times of its 20th century history. This is a period that does not receive adequate attention, because in a 5 millenia old civilisation, a mere century is generally not perceived to be more than a blip. But this has been a fascinating century, full of social, political and economic ferment.
When the century began, India was still under British colonial rule and was dotted with hundreds of small and big kingdoms. A critical character of the economy during the Raj was its total dependence on foreign, mainly British goods. India imported everything, from cars to liquor to patent medicines for a variety of tropical diseases and local agents, again British, sold them to the populace at large and the Raj’s servants in particular. These ads beautifully capture that somewhat leisurely era and it is interesting to know that many of those brand names have survived to this day.
Though ads were mainly printed, other forms of media were also emerging. The enamel board was one such. Though this medium has more or less disappeared from urban centres, it can still be found in semi urban and rural India. Here again, the brands evoke nostalgia for an era that has long gone, but which is still imprinted in our subconscious.
For those who may think that printing techniques were primitive in the earlier parts of this century, the labels advertising fabrics and textiles will come as a pleasant surprise. The quaint labels are quintessentially Indian in visual quality, colour and portraiture, though they appear to have been printed abroad. Their condition defies their age and the gold colour still glitters as new.