Satyajit Ray and Keymer & Co, Calcutta- A case study in creativity
People go gaga over Google, citing it as a company that allows its employees creative freedom. They should learn about D J Keymer & Co, an advertising agency based in Calcutta between 1920 and 1956. No one has found it interesting enough to pen a proper historical account of the firm, and what I know about it is based on Ray’s book ‘My Years with Apu’ and some internet search, but these fragments tell an extraordinary story. That historians in Bengal and the wider country do not find these sorts of stories worth recounting is reflective of the lack of vision that characterises Indian historiography.
What strikes me remarkable about D J Keymer & Co, Calcutta is the freedom it allowed its employees to pursue other interests, and the investment they made in employees.
Mind you, the Keymer office in Calcutta was very different from its counterpart in London. Ray was not impressed at all with the quality of advertising output in their London office when he visited it in 1950. “There was nothing I could learn from our London office, although I could teach a thing or two” he reminisces in the book.
But coming back to Keymer Calcutta, Ray joined the firm in April 1943. He was recruited by D K Gupta, manager, and Mr Broom, the managing director. He rose through the ranks quickly and became the Art Director by 1949. The freedom that Keymer accorded to its employees is reflected through the experiences of both Gupta and Ray.
Gupta while working full time with Keymer started Signet Press which created a mini revolution in the College Street based publishing industry through their innovative design and print. Moreover, Gupta co-opted Ray in the project and the latter designed many book jackets for Signet whilst being employed by Keymer on a full time basis.
Ray undoubtedly got inspired by Gupta’s experience, and dared to experiment with filmmaking while still being in full time employment with the firm. Ray wanted to keep his job as a fallback option. Later, when he got to the business end of making Pather Panchali with it taking up all his available time, Keymer extraordinarily allowed him fully paid leave. Nicholson, the MD of the agency at the time said “You couldn’t possibly work at a desk with such an uncertain project at the back of your mind. Take leave when you need. I will pay your salary.” No wonder Ray was filled with gratitude and wrote “This was like manna from heaven. Now that I think of it, Nicholson…made it possible for me to make Pather Panchali”. Pather Panchali was released in 1955.
And let’s not forget the investment that the firm made in Ray before this. In 1950, it sponsored Ray’s trip to Europe. He was to spend five months in London and a month on the Continent in places of his choice. Ray learnt very little about advertising and a great deal about filmmaking on this Europe trip.
So, was Keymer bitter when Ray ultimately parted with the firm in 1956?
Shortly after completion of the shooting of Pather Panchali, Ray organised a screening for Nicholson and some clients of Keymer. “Nicholson shook my hands warmly after the show, his eyes red and shining. If I needed any further proof of the film faring well with a foreign audience, here it was.” Ray writes in the book. When the time came for the shooting of Aparajito, Ray’s next venture, he had decided to leave his advertising career for good. Nicholson bade him a fond farewell.
Indo-European collaboration was at the heart of the Creative Society in Calcutta. This comes across very clearly in the pages of ‘My Years with Apu’, and 21st century companies can take a lesson or two from D J Keymer & Co Calcutta on how to nurture the creative impulses of employees.
