Art, 2018 to 2022

No client, no brief, no metrics. This is the stuff I make when nobody asked - Inktobers, a small horned kid named Simor, sticker people, and a lot of faces.

Years: 2018 to 2022, going by the dates on the pages
Mediums: Ink, ballpoint, watercolor, vector, pixels, digital paint, laser-engraved bamboo
Lives at: YouTube @heysaloni
Made for: Nobody. That is the whole point.

Every designer has a pile like this somewhere. This is mine: sketchbooks, series I invented rules for, portraits of strangers, and whatever medium had my full attention that month. It is the practice layer under everything else on this site.

The Inktobers

Six ink sketchbook pages: a lighthouse beaming into a starry sky beside a handwritten poem titled Stars, a swimmer floating in a blue-hatched pool titled Mindless with a Micron 01 pen beside it, a cut-out girl on a swing over a green ink wash titled Swing, a Jon Snow portrait with a sword through the page titled Traitor, an arched palace gate titled Guarded, and a rooftop flag scene titled Tranquil — Inktober, over the years: one word a day, one ink page a word. Stars, Mindless, Swing, Traitor - the word is on the page and so is the date.

Simor

In 2019 I invented Simor, a 21 year old kid with horns, because the struggles of growing up are real. He plans trips he cannot afford, prays to the network gods, and drowns in pending work. Autobiographical? No comment.

The Fuzzballs

The Fuzzballs, 2020: a giant who sees no reason to wake up ("what would I even do if I got up"), a skeleton still at work at 2am on a Saturday, and every Indian mom ever.

reKINdle

With a couple of friends I started reKINdle, an Instagram series nudging people to be a little more mindful. The idea was the group’s; every asset was mine.

Faces, mostly

Portraits are the one constant. Strangers, actors, whoever the reference folder coughed up - and when nobody was around, me.

An open sketchbook spread holding six loose watercolor portrait studies: a blonde woman, a green-toned frowning face, a red-hooded head, two classical statue heads in veils, and an ink-and-wash old man — The sketchbook does not care whether they are good. It cares that there are many.

Self-portrait in blue ballpoint pen over a yellow watercolor wash: a smiling woman with glasses and a messy bun, eyes closed, signed Salu 29.5.22 in the corner of the sketchbook page — Self-portrait, ballpoint and watercolor, May 2022. Signed Salu, like everything else here.

Digital painting of a woman with an afro looking over her shoulder, built from purple, gold and green strokes with a faint grid texture over the background — And sometimes the sketchbook is a screen.

The same painting, 30 seconds at a time.

Detours

Two laser-engraved bamboo notebooks: a spiral-bound cover engraved with an ornate tiger head, titled "Tadoba Andhari Tiger Reserve" and captioned "The World Is A Jungle" above a BRTC mark, and a pocket notepad covered edge to edge in an engraved mandala pattern — The physical detour: bamboo notebooks I designed in 2018 while interning with the Government of Maharashtra at the Bamboo Research and Training Centre, Chandrapur. The tiger is for Tadoba, the reserve next door.

Three pixel-art characters on plain backgrounds: a girl with a black ponytail, Doctor Strange with his red cloak and amulet, and Thanos wearing the Infinity Gauntlet — 2019 had a pixel month. Endgame came out; I had opinions, one square at a time.

A sketch that refused to sit still.

The timelapse era

In 2021 the practice went on camera: ten sketch timelapses, E001 to E010. The Lost Boy, Beth Harmon mid-Queen’s-Gambit, an Inktober Loki, chess grandmaster Vidit Gujrathi. Most are under a minute, because watching paint dry is only fun at 20x speed.

Near-finished frame of the afro portrait digital painting timelapse

Hey Saloni 🏂 on YouTube →The whole series lives on the channel. Episode one is at the bottom of this page.10 episodes · E001 to E010 · 2021

7mediums on this one page

10timelapse episodes on YouTube

’18-’22the dated pages

None of it shipped, none of it converted, none of it was A/B tested. Which is exactly why it might be the most honest work sample on this site.