COVID-19, farmers protest dominate amateur snow art in Kashmir

SRINAGAR: Imagine a snowman in full PPE gear spreading a message about COVID 19!

Welcome to Kashmir where snow has brought out the best in people to showcase their creativity.

From `Dr. Snowman’ to farmer snowman, amateur snow art has been dominated by Covid, farm laws, and human rights.

Most of the youngsters used the art to pay tributes to the COVID warriors. Across the lanes and by-lanes, people made snowmen and draped them with PPE suits.

“Stay home, stay safe,” reads the message scribbled on one snowman.

“Art is an expression of the heart. It is pleasing to see people making doctor snowman. Subconsciously it is affection for some person and profession. People in Kashmir have tremendous affection for doctors and paramedics. Time and again we have proved that doctors are serving people effectively in difficult situations, be it flood or pandemic,” said Dr. Suhail Naik, president, Doctors Association Kashmir.

This year, the subtext of snow art was to create awareness and urge people to wear masks. “Message is loud and clear that masks act as a temporary vaccine against the COVID. So our youngsters have tried to send across this message so that people wear masks to keep the virus at bay. It was this mask which allowed socio-economic movement after the lockdown,” he said.

Not only Covid, even farmers’ protests also featured in the amateur snow art. Several people made snow farmers with a placard demanding rollback of farm laws. “No farmer, no food,” reads the placard of one snowman.

Human rights too made it to the snow art with several people making a snowman with messages against abuses. “Zui for Zulm,” reads one message in Urdu.

Noted poet and satirist Zareef Ahmad Zareef said amateur snow art has always been dominated by the happenings of that period.

“During our times, we used to make a snowman of those who were giving us sleepless nights. For example, Chilia-e-Kalan or Chilai-e-Khurud was the dominating character of our times. Now times have changed and education has reached every household. Young educated people are now featuring new things. For instance, Covid is a dominating subject nowadays. It has affected the entire world,” he said.