Colouring book: That is just me thinking

Artist says she always wanted to hawk stuff in Liberty Market

LAHORE:

The table was set—laden with colouring books nestled alongside paper bags that sported the Rem Tem logo smack in the middle of the hustle and bustle of Liberty Market. Sitting on a plastic chair, artist Reema Siddiqi attended to customers, of whom some had found out about the event through Facebook, while others had been passing by. 

“I find this to be such a great stress reliever,” Siddiqi remarked about That’s Just Me Thinking, an illustrated, handcrafted colouring book for adults. “Its compact size and the paperback make the book convenient for people to carry around in their backpacks and use it whenever they desire,” she said.

“I started painting very big sheets and did it in abstract, whatever hit my mind, I would put it down, something like Kadinsky but way more full. I used a lot of lines, circles and shapes and coloured them. People started to comment that I had an extremely good aesthetic sense. Deciding to minimise my work, I started making bookmarks,” Siddiqi said. She said she used to doodle a lot of this and had wanted to provide others a chance to colour what she had doodled. Siddiqi said this was where the    idea of a colouring book for adults had taken root.

“After a few jobs, I realised that I wasn’t cut out for the lifestyle and decided to create something of my own. I was getting fat at those jobs!” she laughed. Siddiqi said her sister had given her the nickname of REMTEM as a joke.

She said she felt that the entrepreneur had kicked in right after, saying she had made everything under the name ever since.  Siddiqi said she had started with bookmarks that she used to sell at bookstores. She said the response to her work was great. Siddiqi said she had later started selling sketchbooks and notebooks before offering the colouring book for sale. “Everything is handmade,” she said.

“I wanted to pursue graphic design for my master’s but my father was not too keen on it,” she said. Siddiqi said he had counselled her to continue with fashion as she had studied it before. She said he had told her that she could do whatever she wanted once she had finished her studies.

“This is the year of making my dreams come true,” Siddiqi said. She said she had always wanted to hawk something at the pavement of Liberty Market. “I also wanted to make a book, which I have, Siddiqi said. She said this was her first book but definitely not the last.

“I think it is a pretty cute concept. It makes for a great stress reliever for adults,” Sanayah Malik of the Citizens Archive of Pakistan said while buying one of the books. PILDAT project officer Abdul Mueed said he had recently read an article in The Guardian about something similar that was published in England. He said the point that the article made was that people tend to lose touch with the idea of basic play, of letting oneself go and colour.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 13^th, 2015.