Jayesh’s journey into visual storytelling began practically at birth. ‘My journey as a visual storyteller began when I was 2,’ he says, recalling how he’d draw everything he observed around the house. As he grew up, this habit evolved from simple doodles into a deeper fascination with creating narratives. That early start in art quickly intertwined with storytelling. Joshi discovered he was naturally crafting lore for his characters as he sketched them. ‘I caught myself mumbling about lore that I would introduce to characters as I drew them,’ he remembers. Today, he is visual artist who blends digital painting, surreal narratives, mythology, and cultural symbols into stories. His work ranges from solo pieces rooted in personal themes to collaborations with iconic musicians like Seedhe Maut.
Evolving Style and Personal Themes
Joshi’s visual style is anything but static. In his words, it ‘changes with medium’, even a swap of brush styles in digital painting can lead him down a different aesthetic path. Broadly, though, he characterizes his art as a form of surreal realism. He loves to blend the techniques of traditional painting with modern digital tools, resulting in images that feel both hyper-real and dreamlike. His pieces often explore weighty themes of sexuality, mythology, dystopia, and multicultural symbolism, all filtered through a constant undercurrent of melancholy. It’s a unique mix that makes a Jayman piece recognizable, even as he continues to mature and experiment.
‘I feel like my work is a reflection of things I can’t verbalize, or desires I can’t communicate, or even feelings I can’t act upon,’ he explains. This personal growth has yielded some standout works that he holds dear. He cites Nectar and an AI-driven series called Creatures of the Spirit among his recent favorites. He also looks back fondly on Undecided//, his ambitious graduation project where a 21-year-old Joshi delved into mythology, religion, sexuality and masculinity. And then there’s Blue, an older self-portrait that remains close to his heart.
Visualising Music
In addition to digital painting, Jayman has been experimenting with AI tools to push his visual storytelling even further. One striking result of his AI exploration is the visualizer he created as a creative exercise on the song Reckless by Hanumankind. The project started almost by accident, Joshi was tinkering with prompts on Midjourney while listening to Hanumankind’s track on loop. Suddenly, an image materialized: Lady Justice with her blindfold ablaze in flames. The result is a trippy, hypnotic visualizer that stands as a testament to Joshi’s ability to merge artificial intelligence with human artistic sensibility.
Beyond personal art and experimental visuals, Joshi has also made a name for himself designing album and project art, most notably for the iconic Delhi hip-hop duo Seedhe Maut. He’s been lucky enough, he says, to collaborate on four different projects with them: the cover art for Bayaan, Nayaab, Kshama, and even the master visual for their recent Shaktimaan Tour. Each collaboration has been a deeply collaborative and intentional process. The Seedhe Maut team often comes in with a clear concept in mind, for instance, invoking Gandhi’s Dandi March as inspiration for Bayaan, or envisioning a tree piercing through clouds for Nayaab. For Kshama, the idea was a dramatic tableau of a giant offering peace to a swordsman.
He firmly believes that visual art can amplify a listener’s experience of music. In an age where singles and streams often prioritize quick hooks over full-album storytelling, he laments that album art as an art form is 'dying.' But he’s convinced it still matters deeply. 'Whatever comes easily, goes away easily too,' he says, explaining that music intended to stand the test of time ought to be intentional in every aspect, from how it’s produced and arranged, to the visuals that represent it. A strong piece of album art can make a song or album stick in a listener’s mind in a more profound way.
Looking to the future, he is excited about stepping beyond static images and into creative direction for music videos. He feels that his background in advertising (where he’s honed skills as an art director) combined with his distinctive artistic taste could translate into music video visuals unlike anything currently on the Indian scene. He’s already working with a couple of musician friends on developing video concepts, so, with a bit of luck, we might see Jayman’s surreal storytelling come to life in motion on a screen soon.
As for dream collaborations, he doesn’t hesitate to drop a few names. His wish list spans from global icons to local innovators: A$AP Rocky, the American rapper known as much for his high-concept music videos as his music, is right at the top. On the home front, he’d love to team up with Dhanji, a rising star in India’s hip-hop scene. And for an experimental edge, Jayman name-checks JPEGMAFIA.
The Drive to be Remembered
Ask Jayman what truly keeps him going each day, and his answer is unexpectedly philosophical: legacy. 'Legacy – oh my god, the legacy of it all,' he exclaims. He’s acutely aware of our cosmic insignificance ('we’re just apes on a tiny blue ball floating across nothingness,' he quips), yet that doesn’t diminish his desire to leave a mark. 'I just want to create work that’s remembered,' He has heroes and inspirations – Michael Jackson, Mac Miller, Jean-Michel Basquiat – whose cultural legacies tower large and whose premature departures from this world were felt by millions.
'Even if I am able to get a small paragraph in an art book that talks about the history of art in India, and a little kid-alien-cyborg-hybrid can run a deep research on me, I’ll live on,' he says.
Artist Jayesh Joshi, Photo by Megha Singha
Words Harita Odedara
Date 8-8-2025