Everyday Life in Art - #OCCreatives with Sukanya Subramaniyan

For this segment of #OCCreatives, we had a chance to speak with Sukanya Subramaniyan, a screenwriter based out of Mumbai. When asked about her art practice, covering everyday life, she said "on heavy days I jot my thoughts and feelings on the notes app. On better days, I turn them into little comics and zines. Someday I hope to meet some of the oldest, biggest trees in the world."

What inspires your work?

I adore artists who can take a seemingly mundane, everyday feeling, and give it a beautiful shape. As someone with an incessant inner monologue, I find that filtering a thought that’s taking up too much space onto paper allows it a possibility of closure.

It’s the everydayness of such feelings, usually, that inspires me to make journal comics and little zines, so I can give them a place to reside outside of my head.

Barring all limitations, what does your dream project look like?

When I started this page in the pandemic I had no idea of what I wanted to achieve or make of it. I still don’t. But four years in, I find that I’ve developed a muscle to just put myself out there and document things that matter to me, even if the outcome isn’t cool or inspiring. I have a relatively healthier relationship with the embarrassment that comes with revealing a side of myself that can be mediocre or even cringe. All of it is growing to be okay with me.

I think it’s because in this time, I’ve come across and connected with so many lovely creators here whose work have become such a familiar, comforting space for me. What they think of their own output is irrelevant, it can’t stop me from enjoying and taking what I want from it anyway.

I think what I’m trying to say is that I don’t have a dream project or a point to why I do this. I do have a dream though to sit in a park some day with everyone I’ve met through this page across the world, get some art supplies, maybe a sandwich, and see where it goes from there.

Can you give us three recommendations for art, films, artists, music, anything!

Man, I can never remember the cool stuff when I want to.

But at the top of my head, Tatami (2023) directed by Guy Nattiv and Zar Amir-Ebrahimi was a movie that enraged and moved me.

I recently revisited Pen15 after two years, a show by Maya Erskine and Anna Konkle. It’s warm, hilarious, real and detailed in equal parts.

Gen Hoshino is a popular Japanese singer-songwriter and musician I discovered two years ago. His upbeat sound and smooth voice continue to uplift me from any shit mood I'm in.