Creating digital typeface out of tribal motifs
Ishan Khosla is a visual artist, designer, educator and Associate Professor in the School of Design, UPES, Dehradun. The Typecraft Initiative is a self-initiated project by Ishan that aims to create a series of digital fonts in the Latin and Indic scripts from Indian crafts and tribal arts. So far, Typecraft has worked with Godna tattoos from Chhattisgarh, Chittara floor and wall art from Karnataka, Mithila art from Bihar and numerous embroideries (Pakko, Dhebaria Rabari and Soof) from Kutch in the western state of Gujarat.
Ishan has turned a body language (language inscribed on body) into a typeface by making a digital typeface of the tribal tattoos of Chhattisgarh. The typecraft initiative started in 2012. It originated with the idea that how designers live in the urban areas and work on projects completely divorced from rural India, consequently design in India do not seem Indian. Most design studios fail to do something unique like other countries especially in the field of Graphic Design. This ushered in the idea of incorporating Indian designs in Graphic Design. They started slowly with the mehndi design (henna tattoos) and it gradually broadened to other designs also. The whole experience has been exciting to the community and innovative for the designers, as the transformation of a craft into a typeface is a new thing. The resultant typecraft has been promoted at different places including Tokyo. It was important to exhibit them as it helps in archiving them which is important to prevent them from disappearing.