CARDS - Comments

Serendipity is how I landed up in one of the completely different courses of EPGP! Being a placement committee member, I was in a meeting with CDS and when the meeting finished, I realized that I had kept my bag in the classroom. I came back only to find that the CARDS class had started. I wanted to quietly sneak-in, pick my bag up and sneak back out. With this intention, I sneaked in. But guess what, I could not find my bag where I left it, someone had shifted it. It looked odd to come in the middle of a class, rummage for the bag (and disturb the class in the process) and then leave. So, I decided to wait it out. For the first few minutes I started thinking about other things that had to be done. Then the professor’s enthusiasm and passion for what he was teaching got my attention. I was surprised when I realized that he was teaching how multiple dimensions are used in art, in images, in videos and how dimensions add complexity to what is being conveyed and in the process, reveal more information and inhibit the brain’s creativity and imagination! This was a completely new way to look at things! I was hooked – and I sat through the class, attended the next class as well and ended up taking the course.

Partha Sarathi Mukhopadhyay

EPGP 2013-14, IIMB

 

 

I always wanted to thank you once for such as wonderful journey through the CARDS course and wanted to jot down a few words regarding my experience in the CARDS classroom sessions and how I felt lot more enriched after this course.

 Creativity has always been an interesting component which excited me and this course made me feel immensely contended that I had made the right decision in choosing this course. It was amazing to see the meticulous planning from your side in identifying the right content for each classroom session based on your extensive research and expertise of more than 40 years. 

It has been a very refreshing journey for ALL of us in the class and it not only helped us understand the varied aspects of creativity across visual and aural domains but also helped appreciate the aspects such as how temporal contrast can be applied effectively to improve the impact of a situation or music, how sylvette can be leveraged to improve the contrast of a situation, how creativity can be embedded into humor in an unconventional manner, the bi-associations etc. In addition, I would not have, otherwise, realized the importance and impact that silence could have in various situations. The sessions around leveraging Escher’s art forms to draw metaphorical connections between music and drawings have been phenomenal.

I personally believe that but for your strong passion and eagerness to share your understanding with the class, this course could not have been so impressive and beneficial. Last but not the least, the Bose audio system you brought in for each class was simply superb and was a great complementary tool in the process.

With this enhanced understanding, we are now able to correlate many creative aspects around us be it in advertisements, music, songs, documentaries or movies.

There were multiple instances in which we (including other classmates) would make an observation or two on how you would have highlighted the nuances of silence, temporal contrast, silhouette, etc. on our observations !!!

Thank you Sir, once again. You definitely made a HUGE difference in the way we observe things around us.

Ramkumar JHS

EPGP 2013-14, IIMB

 

I was going through some of our class notes recently and could appreciate many good things we learned during the course of sessions.

 

I really liked the way you taught us to appreciate meanings and beauty in artistic creations by some great artists. Further, CARDS was not limited to only one or two streams of arts, but covers wide range of subjects from music to mathematics. Some of the songs you showed us during the classes must have been seen by me may be hundreds of times. But the way you identified the finer elements of lights, camera movements matching with music and rhythms, editing, etc.  showed the same songs in new light. My ability to enjoy such elements of arts has really gone up post your classes.

 

I could never imagine mathematics could be so interesting while going through routine boring algebraic equations and trigonometry. Your method of teaching coupled with personal passion, which reflects in the way you communicate, made us really look at creative elements in simple mathematical things like formula for calculating area of circle and sphere etc.

 

Finally, the learning didn’t stop at classes but continued through the exams as well. The piece of story you gave us in the exam, a masterpiece in itself, made me really enjoy my exam and also appreciate fineries in literature.

 

To put it in the least, I have developed a new way and paradigm of looking at music, films, paintings, etc. and thereby enhancing my pleasure quotient in enjoying these art forms multiple times.

 

So thank you once again sir.

Vishal Waikar

EPGP 1013-14

 

 

The course challenged me to inculcate an inclination to look beyond what is readily obvious, and out there to be seen and heard. It tested my conventional way of performing simple tasks e.g. listening to music, watching movies, reading literature, using products, and much more. In fact, it proved to be a test for almost all my senses!

There are many unique attributes to this course. The contents are beyond science and regular paradigms of management, so I felt that I was in for a treat to get this unique perspective from the professor.

It is more of a lifestyle change. The essence behind the course, if understood properly, can help create a lens in front of one’s eyes, which will give one a unique perspective into creativity and sensitize one to appreciate the good versus the bad, better versus the good, and the best versus the better of almost any and everything in life.

Puneet Arora

EPGP 2013-14

Most unique of all the courses I have studied and will probably study at IIMB - These are what my first words will be about CARDS. I will say I was blessed to study under Prof. Shekar. His excellent knowledge in the realms of music, filmography, photography, literature and other arts made the diffusion of knowledge from him to the class very easy. I can bet, no examination in the world test the real skills of your brain. Prof. Shekar's examination did. It took a lot of mind work to solve just half of the question paper.

I would recommend this course to all the students who are interested in learning something new in life that is exclusive to Prof. Shekar rather than learning things that can be easily taught through books. I wish I had more sessions to attend to.

Himanshu Joshi

EPGP 2011-12

The elective course CARDS offered by you to the EPGP 2010-11 batch has been a great learning experience. Even for someone with no background in music and other arts, this course was very relevant.

We got to learn important aspects of creativity in audio, video and literature.

As rightly said in one of the sessions...

"it's a very serious course and happens to be enjoyable as well"

I highly recommend this course to future batches as it is a unique course, not to be missed!

Priti Raj

EPGP 2010-11, IIMB

 

 

I really enjoyed the CARDS course. The concepts you taught were a real eye opener for me. It really helped me appreciate and enjoy the finer nuances in creativity. Now, I no longer listen to music or watch movies without looking for the creative aspects that you opened our eyes to. Whenever I hear a piece of music, I tend to look for those creative aspects and it is always a great experience discovering them. The course also made me think laterally, especially the design sessions. I strongly recommend the CARDS course for every student.
Vishnuprasad Gopinath Balu
EPGP-2011, IIMB

 

CARTS 2013 - Comments

Somewhere in the mad rush, I realized that I had stopped observing keenly and so wanted to take up a subject that provides me the opportunity to reflect.  It was a pleasure exploring CARTS as a subject and I loved attending the classes.

I would have never noticed the technical intricacies that go behind an work of art, in spite of being an artist myself. The way you explained the thought process behind each artwork, with utmost patience, guided the mind to pay attention in that direction.  

CARTS helped me particularly in being more conscious of my surrounding and being mindful.

Amrapali Bhowmik
PGP 2012-14, IIMB 

I am glad that I got a chance to be part of CARTS, a well designed course that will stimulate you to think beyond what you see. It makes you more conscious of our surroundings and explore the plethora of different variables related to creativity in both arts and science. There are moments when you'll be awestruck and there will be moments when you'll suddenly feel a sense of joy and excitement as there is  sense of accomplishment in being able to appreciate creativity and beauty like never before. It's like a journey where you develop deeper intimacy and connection with the beauty around you. An experience that will make you believe there is more life than what you are currently experiencing. The course is a compilation of fascinating literature, music and videos that will help you to release your creative power, which was blocked consciously or unconsciously as we grew up and let it flow naturally once again.

Harshita Mehton
PGP 2012-14, IIMB 

CARTS is that one subject in which I was on a roller coaster learning ride in each of the class. I went to every class with an enthusiasm that I now rarely associate with classes. It opened a world of interpretation and understanding of things which till now I had taken for granted. Yes, I watch movies and listen to songs. I enjoy books and laugh at jokes but then it was all very superficial. I did learn appreciating text and poems as a part of literature courses in school but never thought that the application of those ideas extend far beyond the boundaries of literary material. The unifying themes of beauty and art and how these themes transcend all boundaries is something that made the CARTS subject a wonder to behold for me. It is very interesting to note how the same themes, either as it is or with small modifications, are present across variety of artistic material and how despite these similarities the effect conjured by these art forms is so different. No one really does compare a piece of music to a joke or a beautiful picture to a cartoon. Some would even consider it a sacrilege to do so. But then is that really the case? This is what I learned to question and the answers provided by CARTS are mesmerizing. The thread of commonality that runs through these seemingly disconnected topics is that human mind responds to certain features and aspects in a positive way irrespective of how they are camouflaged & this opens up a world of opportunities for anyone looking to interact or affect another person.

Time and again, friends around me questioned the importance of such a subject in a management course. And to be frank, so did I. How is it that a music appreciation lecture will ever help me in solving a management crisis? After attending the sessions, I know that this perhaps was one of the most insightful lectures that I will ever attend. If I map each lecture to learning, most of the lecture was all about how human’s respond to different stimuli and how most of these responses or stimuli are actually well designed forms of the same underlying brain wiring that we all have. The implications can be mapped to how a product will be perceived, how an ad campaign will be received and what the consumer actually appreciates and needs.

Things like introduction of percussion in a music piece or the importance of snatches of flute in a piece teaches me that how every little part is what makes the whole so great. It taught me how little things around me are so full of beauty and it taught me the power of appreciation. In addition, the idea that with minute changes a day to day object can become a rare artifice is worth pursuing and gives us the incentive to work a little extra in making the things what they have potential to be.Most importantly I believe it has helped me in viewing surroundings and art form in my day to day life with much more respect and credence than I ever associated with these. On a philosophical level, the exercises on imagining the contents of a blurred image helped me understand that this is how life too unfolds. Things in future remain hazy but it is our present view of these blurred images that will shape them in reality.

Things that I enjoyed the most:

1. The professor’s enthusiasm was the highlight of the entire course for me because had it not been for that, I would have gone through it without being inspired myself.

2. I really enjoyed the classes on humor, because to understand how humor also has underlying science was something very new to me.

3. The essays by Tolstoy were also a great read.

Thank You Sir for a great experience!! J

Vidhi Agarwal
PGP 2012-14, IIMB

I have truly enjoyed the CARTS course as it is very different from the regular MBA curriculum. It provides you a break from the monotonous schedule and gives you a platform to appreciate the depth and creativity in different art forms. You get to know the kind of hard work an artist puts in while making a song, movie, cartoon or even a sketch. At the back end, this course might help you in subtle ways if you are interested in marketing. For example, in designing marketing campaigns, advertisements, etc. On the whole, I would say that it adds a new flavor/dimension to life, especially for someone like me, belonging to a typical engineering background. 
Samita Bansal
PGP 2012-14, IIMB 



I was one of your students in the CARTS course last term and I found the experience very good. I learned a lot about the nuances of understanding the finer details behind music, movies and literature. I was already a fan of old Hindi music, and now I feel listening to them an even more enriching experience. Never before have exams been more fun- especially the screening of the scene from Psycho, which enabled me to view it in a whole new light with the understanding of the course. I also found all the literature based classes very interesting, as well as the readings associated with them- especially the one on comedy and the excerpts from Les Miserables. I really appreciate the effort you put into the course, and count myself lucky that I got to be a part of it.
Smita Singh
PGP 2012-14, IIMB 



I would like to share my comments on the CARTS course that I had taken during my term 4.  Initially, before taking the course I had my apprehensions regarding the course since I was not well versed with any form of music but only very interested in music and other art forms. However, you made sure within 2 or 3 classes that my apprehensions were removed from the picture. 

According to me, CARTS is an excellent platform for honing one's observation skills. Before that, I never would have paid attention to the nuances that exist. All the more surprising and interesting was the theory behind those nuances which proved the enormous amount of efforts that go into making a piece right. CARTS has made me appreciate art much more than before. Without attributing a success to serendipity, I now try to understand the process behind it and how creatively a creator has used the different elements in different styles consciously. The classroom sessions were very interesting and the readings in the course were also very intriguing and different, and helped us think about art and the relationship it holds with science from different perspectives. I loved the piece by Tolstoy in particular.

 At the end of the term, the course gave me closure of having done something good for myself and was a sure shot relief from the other usual courses  :)
Abhinaya Sivanandham
PGP 2012-14, IIMB 
  

In an environment where everybody is trying to equip themselves with the knowledge and skills to create a niche for themselves in the industry, an opportunity to enroll oneself in a course like CARTS in itself is a wonder. For a someone who appreciates art like I do, it adds multiple dimensions to view, understand and recreate the art. For the aficionados of creativity, it helps in understanding the nuances of the various creations that we have grown up appreciating. Finally, the followers of science would uncover that there is a method to the madness.

Binoy Subba
PGP 2012-14, IIMB