Why The Fark ?
For a land as diverse as India, a vast majority of society tends to be a bit unaccepting of anything that sicks out of the norm. ‘Log Kya Kahenge’ (What will people say?) is a term that governs thoughts and conversations. This is something that bleeds out into expectations of people to look a certain way - have a certain skin colour, height, weight and even hair type. This has led to certain unfair beauty standards that are currently still a big part of Indian society.
In 2020, the Indian Government is finally considering placing penalties on discriminative advertisements, such as those for fairness creams. However, there still isn’t a big discussion about equalising the other unfair beauty standards that plague society.
Why the Fark? (Fark meaning difference in Hindi) is a collection of stories of young Indian women and how they’ve personally battled these unfair beauty standards. It is a big middle finger to these beauty standards. This zine features stories of small and large victories of acceptance and self-love. Each of these stories aim to inspire a certain sense of pride and love with oneself.
Brief Featuring: Editorial Design, Photography, Illustration
In 2020, the Indian Government is finally considering placing penalties on discriminative advertisements, such as those for fairness creams. However, there still isn’t a big discussion about equalising the other unfair beauty standards that plague society.
Why the Fark? (Fark meaning difference in Hindi) is a collection of stories of young Indian women and how they’ve personally battled these unfair beauty standards. It is a big middle finger to these beauty standards. This zine features stories of small and large victories of acceptance and self-love. Each of these stories aim to inspire a certain sense of pride and love with oneself.
Brief Featuring: Editorial Design, Photography, Illustration
In collaboration with Anushka Kelkar
Each story features a little card with a poignant statement from each story. These cards are rip-able and credit card sized, to allow for one to carry them on their person, for a shot of motivation.
Why the Fark? is a riso-printed zine. Not only does riso-printing allow for quick printing of a large number of copies, but also due to its layered nature, it gives way to printing imperfections, which is an interesting reference to the subject matter of the zine. The neon-esque colour of the soy inks also add a beautiful vibrancy that is hard to get with other digital printers.
The cover design was influenced by everyday Indian matchboxes. There are an upward of thousand different designs, each beautiful and unique. In addition, most of these boxes have been printed on using an offset method, which can lead to bleeds and mistakes in the prints, similar to the look of the riso-prints.
