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~ The shift from hand-painted signs to digital flex banners is leaving cities, including those in Goa, looking increasingly identical, eroding local identity and character.<\/strong><\/p>\n ~ Indian typographer Pooja Saxena spotlights Goa\u2019s Art Deco and Art Nouveau architectural history, reflected in its hand-crafted street lettering.<\/strong><\/p>\n Goa Khabar:<\/strong> As digital flex signages inspired by an \u2018Airbnb aesthetic\u2019 replace hand-painted boards across Panaji and other Goan towns, streets are beginning to look like those elsewhere in mainstream India, with local character giving way to a standardised visual language and traditional sign painters quietly disappearing.<\/p>\n This changing streetscape formed the context of a recent MOG Sunday session on\u00a0Indian Street Lettering\u00a0at the Museum of Goa (MOG), where award-winning typeface designer and lettering artist Pooja Saxena drew attention to Goa\u2019s street lettering as a visual record of its architectural and cultural history.<\/p>\n Saxena, an ace typeface designer, warned that the rise of digital flex signs, typically LED banner signs stretched over metal frames, is creating an \u2018Airbnb aesthetic\u2019, where cities begin to look indistinguishable from one another.<\/p>\n \u201cAs you walk through a city, you can\u2019t tell where you are,\u201d she explained, emphasising that the loss is not only aesthetic but economic as well. \u201cWhen hand-painted signs disappear, an entire livelihood disappears with them. It\u2019s a craft that simply vanishes. I don\u2019t want these to exist only as museum objects. They make sense only if they survive as functional elements and as objects of cultural expression in the real world.\u201d<\/p>\n Speaking about her book project\u00a0India Street Lettering: A Journey Through Typographic Craft & Culture, Saxena noted that lettering often reflects the historical period in which a place developed.<\/p>\n Highlighting Panaji\u2019s streetscape, Saxena pointed to how signage reflects the city\u2019s architectural history and material culture.<\/p>\n \u201cIn Panaji, Art Deco and Art Nouveau influences in signage align with the city\u2019s architecture. Goa\u2019s visual identity is shaped by elements like azulejos, wood and three-dimensional lettering,\u201d she said in her conversation with Goa-based visual artist Avani Tanya, adding that context determines how such design elements are read, while the coastal climate affects materials, making frequent repainting both necessary and a sign of continued care despite gradual wear.<\/p>\n According to Saxena, street lettering does not merely serve a functional purpose, but operates as a gestural expression shaped by the hand. \u201cMy biggest fear was that I don\u2019t write often enough and that I no longer trust my own hands,\u201d she admitted, reflecting on growing digital dependency. Speaking about her book, Saxena said it focuses on letterforms created using a range of analogue techniques, including hand painting and other specialised processes. \u201cThe skill involved in this craft deserves recognition because these forms are intentional in a way digital fonts are not,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n Saxena expressed hope that readers feel encouraged to look at their marketplaces with fresh eyes. \u201cI like to think that I’ve infected more people with a virus,” she joked. “I’m really happy if any of you go back and start noticing public lettering a little bit more.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" ~ The shift from hand-painted signs to digital flex banners is leaving cities, including those in Goa, looking increasingly identical, eroding local identity and character. ~ Indian typographer Pooja Saxena spotlights Goa\u2019s Art Deco and Art Nouveau architectural history, reflected in its hand-crafted street lettering. Goa Khabar: As digital flex signages inspired by an \u2018Airbnb […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25169,"featured_media":109877,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[155,6],"tags":[3794],"class_list":["post-109876","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-155","category-6","tag-featured"],"read":true,"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109876","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/25169"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=109876"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109876\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":109878,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/109876\/revisions\/109878"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/109877"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=109876"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=109876"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.goakhabar.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=109876"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}