Mohammed Sajid's 'Folks of Kerala' Series Shortlisted for AOI World Illustration Awards

Mohammed Sajid’s ongoing illustration series, Folks of Kerala, which brings attention to the everyday workers often overlooked in the urban landscapes of his home state, has been nominated for the prestigious AOI World Illustration Awards 2026. The nomination recognises the second edition of the series, a vibrant collection of portraits that give identity and dignity to people such as flower sellers, fish hawkers, security guards, and street sweepers.

The series, created by the Bengaluru-based artist from Perambra in Kozhikode, Kerala, features eight portraits in its latest iteration: a chai maker, security guard, tailor, street sweeper, fish seller, coir worker, postman, and flower seller. Each subject is surrounded by the objects, textures, and words that define their daily lives, offering a detailed, personal glimpse into their world. Sajid gives them names and backstories, refusing to let them blend into the background.

Born out of what the artist describes as ‘homesickness’, the series spotlights people Sajid encountered every day but rarely paid close attention to while growing up. After earning a degree in Design and Applied Arts from the College of Fine Arts Kerala in Thiruvananthapuram in 2015, he moved to Bengaluru. The shift to a faster-paced urban environment sharpened his appreciation for the community he had left behind. ‘I felt people in Bengaluru were hesitant to smile. Even when they did, it felt different,’ Sajid recalls. ‘I grew up in a community where we knew everything about our neighbours.’

The first Folks of Kerala series was completed in 2018 and drew heavily from Indian folk aesthetics. Teal hues were used to depict skin tones, and the portraits offered minimal contextual information through their settings. That series, consisting of 13 illustrations, emerged from a desire to create something ‘familiar yet unique’, but the process left Sajid creatively exhausted. ‘I discontinued it because of fatigue,’ he says.

The project was revived in 2025 with a more layered approach. ‘This time, I surrounded the subjects with objects and words associated with them. After completing the portraits, I gave them names and backstories. The colour palette and contrast are different too,’ Sajid explains. The newer works lean towards realism, particularly in their depiction of dusky complexions and distinctive facial features, while embracing a vibrant, pop art-inspired visual language. The compositions are unapologetically maximalist, filled with typography, objects, gridlines, and design markings.

These marks also serve a secondary purpose. ‘The lines and dots were added as a challenge to AI to try and replicate the kind of work I do,’ Sajid states. ‘Using AI to create art in our style is unacceptable to me as an artist. Some may see these marks as rough work, but they are also a nod to my training as a design student.’

Sajid is no stranger to high-profile illustration work. In 2019, he designed the Google Doodle marking actor Madhubala’s 84th birth anniversary, depicting her iconic role as Anarkali in Mughal-e-Azam (1960). For that artwork, he reinterpreted the CMYK colour palette to evoke the visual language of the film’s era.

The vibrancy of his work, he says, is rooted in Kerala itself. ‘Growing up in Kerala, temple festivals were explosions of colour. The lorries on our roads, the posters at bus stops, even the illustrations beside autorickshaw number plates — nothing is subdued,’ he notes. His earliest artistic influence, however, was closer to home. ‘I remember colouring sessions with my mother when I was young. She would secretly sketch portraits of actors from magazine covers, even though our religion discouraged us from reading them. There was also a mural in my third-grade classroom — coconut trees, water bodies and a landscape — painted by her.’

As for future additions to the series, Sajid is in no hurry. ‘I started making these works to break away from the monotony of daily life,’ he says. ‘I don’t want to force myself to create them.’