We are exploring ourselves everyday and want you to come with us on a journey. The journey called ‘I’ in Togetherness where MEE and JEY explores how they are growing as a couple. It’s a series of 52 photographs in 52 weeks exploring our lives and how we have impacted each other. Every Saturday a photo comes on Instagram , Twitter and our Facebook accounts. Check them out. Here is the series which will enter on its 17th week on 3rd September 2016.
Enjoy and please write what you think about it.
TO SEE THE PICS OF WEEK 1 TO 7. FOLLOW THIS LINK
JEY – WEEK 16-
Books have been an integral part of the Mee-Jey relationship. It was a book which made us fall in love with each other but that story will be told somewhere else.
Because of love of books Mee and Jey use to discuss about books. Later when Jey found that Mee is neck deep in art, he tried to understand art. Jey had seen a lot of museums in Europe but he couldn’t understand art in the way Mee understood it got connected to it. Other than learning it from Mee, Jey decided to read about art in a systematic way and he brought his first book on ART. It was the most expensive book Jey has bought at that time. 1700 Hundred indian rupees which is a lot of money but this book was perfect for someone like Jey whi wanted to read about art in a simple yet interesting way. E.H.Gombrich became his art companion for a while and Jey was able to hold long conversation with Mee on European art. In return Mee enlightened Jey about about the practice of art.
The partnership grew and they started working as a unit. Theory and practice. Jey giving abstract ideas and Mee refining them executing them and both of them learning immensely through that process. Meenakshi took serious theory lessons later through Berger and Benjamin with which Jey still struggles but Jey is sure he will reach there. He will grow up to understand it.
Now for Mee and Jey Art is like their Baby.
MEE- Week 16-
It is interesting how ideas emerge from gray mass in brain, get printed in black & white words in books and add colorful meanings to life of its readers.
Mee and Jey went through a similar trajectory of evolution with books. While Mee was still a student, thinking in set pattern trying hard to make a mark for herself, Jey intervened her struggle with herself. He gifted her a tiny black & white book ‘Ways of Seeing’ by John Berger. This book transformed Mee as it gave her an insight to see and perceive the world as well as make the world see her in different lights. At the same time Jey’s interests were leaning towards Arts. He was creating a new collection in their personal library with art related books. He began skimming through lots of art journals and books to try understand and help Mee her in her journey as an autodidact artist.
Over the years Mee sneeked out of her white-blue-green dress code to embrace more colors, changed from a bun-hair to turban and jeans-kirta to flowy dresses and dungaree. ‘Ways of Seeing’ changed not just her perspective but also her as an Individual.
JEY- WEEK- 15-
Mee had not travelled to any place before she became partner of Jey. On the other hand Jey was a seasoned traveller but was looking for company and meaning to his travels. In the beginning Mee and Jey travelled many places in public transport an had amazing/horrible experiences. Slowly Mee has got the travel bug and in one fine evening they decided to collaborate their interests TRAVEL AND ART.
With this the art project Artologue was born. They started travelling on their motorcycle to different places to stay with local people and paint in their walls. In las four years Mee and Jey have travelled more than 18 stars of India covering a distance of more than 30 thousand kilometer painting more than 50 murals and interacted with more than 20 thousand people.
Artologue is their first baby. They later embarked on many collaborative creative journeys together.
MEE- WEEK-15-
Good food, comfortable clothes, classic literature and travels make a person grow wise. The idea is to continuously evolve through all these agents of learning. This was a lesson learnt by MEE &JEY early in their life in Togetherness.
Their first few travels were flight journeys to Kashmir and Chennai. Next when travel began to fascinate them, they traveled in trains. To really know the people and culture of their Yatras, they began to travel by local buses and tanga/ tumtum, riksha etc. Guess the freedom to stop longer and as per their wish, Mee &Jey started undertaking journeys on their Green Bullet. From flights to Bullet was just the beginning of their life as a crazy couple looking for lessons to learn from nature ( paces, people and experiences). Following their heart and breaking rigid formats was their motto and that the process and journeys are more important than the final output and destination’ , was their latest wisdom.
Over years they travelled to nealy 20 states, making friends with thousands of people and finding ‘home’ in different parts of India.
JEY-WEEK-14-
Mee and Jey is not only about Love and colors. They fight like cats and dogs. This fight was started on a trivial issue of Jey wanting to wear Mee’s T-shirt and get his hair braided. Mee suggested otherwise. The quarrel began and reached up to the level where they had made a deal earlier.
The deal is that whenever Mee and Jey fight. One of them keeps quite and walk out of the house without mobile. Whatever they do, they are separated for next 20 minutes to few hours. Then one comes back to house and everything gets normal. They discuss the faults after a day or two and say sorry to each other.
In the beginning of the relationship Mee and Jey realised that both of them talk a lot and fights were bound to happen. During any fight Jey talks talks and talks and Mee Keeps her ears closed and it becomes unbearable for both. so One of them walks out and take a stroll and reflects. The other one sits at home and reflects.
In the first few months of the partnership they devised the way to live happily.
Every couple has to develop their own ways to fight and reconcile. This is our way to solve.
Mee and Jey also have big fights but that will come in the later part of this series.
Those who don’t know , this is a series of 52 photos in 52 weeks tracing the journey of a couple together in life. How they grow as Individual and as a couple.
MEE-WEEK-14-
They quarrel like cats and dogs. Last they quarreled for as silli a reason as their hair-style. Mee was making braids in her hair and Jey wanted the same design in his hair. Since it was a very girly hair style, Mee did not want to do it in Jey’s hairs. But Jey was adamant that Mee has to do the same hair style in his hair. This silly talk turned into a fight like as always and as per our ‘deal’, Mee left for a walk.
Mee & Jey are both very talkative. They often get into quarrels andsince Jey talks hell lot, Mee turns her def ear to him. Soon they devised a better way of resolving issues. They made a deal about fight. Whenever Mee & Jey fight one of them leaves home for a long walk. This gives them enough time to calm down, ponder upon the cause of tension and readies them to reconcile when the other one returns home.
For the photo shoot Mr. Jey wanted to wear pink and could not find one so he wore Mee’s shirt.
JEY- WEEK-13-
Hairs have been an integral part in the lives of Jey Couple. Even before meeting Mee, Jey was mad about long hairs and he always wanted to grow hairs like his mother. Later the fascination turned to Mee’s long hairs. One of the reasons Jey fell for Mee was her long hairs.
As a kid,Jey was always scolded for his long locks and many times teachers complained to his parents about it.
Once Jey got humiliated by a teacher in the school who called him Nachaniya Which means street dancer kind of a thing which was a negative term in the small colony Jey grew up. still the fascination remained and he always cared for his hairs.
Once the partnership with Mee started, she took care of both not only in terms of nutrition but also making them beautiful with different designs.
Jey’s hairs have become her permanent muse with which she plays, making braids, beading them, making plaits and what not.
It was the secret desire of Jey always to get his these colorful threads in his hairs and Mee did it for the first time few years back. Jey still fancy these threads in his hairs and occasionally get it done.
MEE-WEEK-13-
MEE ‘s love for long hair comes from her mother, who always had and till today has knee length hair. Since she shared her mothers dusky skin tone, curvy frame, fish eyes, and love for art, long hair brought Mee closer to her Mother Image.
Later when JEY fell in love with MEE and told her about his love for long hair, a new phase of Love for long locks began. Mee & Jey both decorate their hair and and are never shy of experimenting with new hair styles. Mee lives playing with Jey’s long locks. It is almost like being twins.
JEY-WEEK-12-
Masks have been a long term fascination of Mee and Jey although the interest developed separately.While Jey was in London he got this mask from Venice on a huge price (if one compare the price in Rupees). Jey read abput the mask ritual of Venice and was fascinated with them. On the other side Mee was and is still in love with mummies, pharoah and african tribal masks. After marriage we had bought quite a few masks but these two are our favourite. The black one was collected by Mee and that one looks happy always like Jey. The venician one is artistic as Mee and we feel that these masks were made for Mee-Jey. Do not miss the hairdo though in the picture.
MEE-WEEK-12-
MEE & JEY are a couple trying to grow and help grow each other through colors, writings and travels. While Jey writes, Mee paints and vice versa. At times Mee draws elements from Jey’s punch packed two liners, romantic poems, captivating short stories and long-hand writings about life. Jey’s writings are inevitably influenced from shades of colors that Mee plays with. This togetherness of each other’s passions and interests keeps Mee & Jey growing/going.
The Mee Mask is from Venice that has sketches drawn on it by street artist/ seller and Jey Mask is a solid wood mask is from Jharkhand. This no-frill mask is what Jey is all about.
JEY-WEEK-11-
Specs have been an integral part in life of Jey since his school days. As he explains, he couldn’t understand why he had to squeeze his eyes to read the blackboard for more than an year. Later he realized his eyes need power glasses. Jey started wearing glasses many years back with black and white frames most of the time. After marriage Mee asked him to wear colorful frames…with the paintings and colors in life Jey tried the yellow frame and then in next few months Jey wore red, pink, yellow, green , blue orange frames.
The colorful frames make Jey happy and he is thankful to Mee for introducing him to colors. Many people think Jey wore glasses for style quotient. Only few knows Jey has minus five power in his eyes…still these colorful frames makes Jey look Cool and he feels cool.
These frames made Jey a different person, Someone who doesn’t bother about what people will say and that helps him in doing things differently and innovating in life.
MEE-WEEK-11-
JEY has a power of -5.5 in both his eyes. He can’t see properly at a distance without his glasses. He transformed glasses from an embarrassment to a fashion status. His obsession for colorful frames are of course fueled by MEE’s encouragement and love for colors. In fact Mee always pays for Jey’s frames. JEY has over 60 frames that he uses. Some others are old, discarded and broken. MEE has just 4 shades and she borrowed some from Jey for the photo shoot.
JEY-WEEK-10-
Painting is something JEY has not done in his life ever, till he got married to MEE. Slowly and steadly Jey became an apprentice to Mee and learnt a fair bit about colors and brushes. Jey can now paint for his own enjoyment. He normally picks up brush on his weekends or when he is stressed. Few years back when Jey came back from office, stressed and angry, Mee was painting. Jey was furious and wanted to break things. Mee was painting something so she calmly asks jey to sit and gave him a big brush and a sheet of paper. Jey made violent strokes with different colors but slowly the strokes went smooth. Jey was in peace within 20 minutes. Later Mee played with those bold strokes and turned them into fishes which amused Jey to an extent that he decided to paint whenever he can. That painting is named ANARCHY and is still in our bedroom.
MEE-WEEK-10-
6 years back when MEE suffered from her first failure and depression, JEY brought colors to her rescue. Not truly realizing it, but colors have always rescued MEE&JEY from their failures, pains, loneliness, depressions and difficult times. Mee painted Jey’s face with her colors and Jey painted Mee’s face.
JEY-WEEK-9-
One of those weeks when MEE falls sick and JEY is confused what to do next. He tries his hands at everything from cooking, washing dishes, cleaning religiously and feels exasperated. Humidity, daily stress and other day to day crap takes a toll on JEY and he doesn’t want to see anything with MEE who is down with viral and her eyes are anyways closed with fever.
In our growth together, There are these moments where one has to be with the other. Life is not happy all the times.it has different colors. This week its a bit gloomy but that’s life.
MEE-WEEK-9
Jey has been literally on a hospital diet of chai biscuit in breakfast, overcooked runny rice (margilla) and salt in lunch and roti/chapati with milk in dinner for past three days. It is not that he is sick. Mee is down with viral fever and can hardly even stand because of fever and weakness. Mee sleeps all day under fever, stays up all night and keeps Jey up who watched movies till Mee falls asleep. Poor Jey has to endure all this bland food, no outing, all cooking and cleaning and short hours of sleep because of Mee.
JEY-WEEK-8-
Jey has always been fascinated with the jewellery (of a different kind) worn by the sadhus and he started collecting them since childhood. He still buys junk to wear on his wrist and neck. Mee is interested in the traditional jewellery. No gold. Mostly silver and local tribal stuff. Another area where our interest matched without any deliberate effort.
MEE-WEEK-8
10 years back Jey brought Mee a bag full of jeweleries from London. Back then all Mee could handle was a watch gifted by her father. In all these years Jey kept gifting Mee more and more jeweleries and Mee kept designing even more accessories for Jey, although M&J always share each other’s jewelries, cloths, choices and beauty.