About Shedding Absurd Baggage
and Breaking the Shells
Noted Sculptor Reghunathan K makes a re-entry in the art scene with a set of new sculptures, which are currently on display at the Kashi Art Gallery, Kochi. Reghunathan, in a candid interview with the acclaimed painter Rajan M.Krishnan, talks about his decade long silence, the tribulations that he faced and about the new works that herald his homecoming. Excerpts:
Rajan Krishnan: Reghu, this is your much awaited solo exhibition. In 1990 when I joined the College of Fine Arts Thiruvananthapuram, you were one of the most known names among the seniors. I had even seen some of your works at the Sculpture Department. But I had to wait till 2006 to see a body of your works! It’s strange and surprising that it took so long. What made you wait so long to come out with the present body of works?
Reghunathan : For an artist who completed his studies in 1987, nineteen years is a pretty long time for the first solo show, I know! Even I’m surprised to learn that fact!
It would be rather incorrect to say that I was not engaged in any sort of artistic quest during the past two decades. To be true, those were years of confusion and conflicts. The conflict of holding onto your artistic self as against you as a person taking upon the responsibilities of a social and family being… The confusion arising out of the sudden disappearance of the artistic fraternity that had existed during our student days…all was there.
RK : Instead of ‘confusion,’ I’d like to call it a sort of vacuum. How did that vacuum happen?
Reghu: To make you understand about this period of confusion, or vacuum as you said, I’d need to recall our college days. Those were the early days of the Thiruvananthapuram Fine Arts College, metamorphosis into a college of Visual Arts from that of an arts and crafts institute. The college was being upgraded. The process of up gradation was fraught with turbulences. The agitation of the Fine Arts College students in those days is a well-known chapter in Kerala’s cultural history itself. It was for the first time that the young art students had come out of their institution to seek the support and cooperation of the public for solving their academic issues. For the first time in Kerala, the public was becoming aware that art had a deep link with society. We were agitating to get the five-year diploma course recognized, to start the graduation course, to get the recognition of the universities, for better library facilities and for better academic environment in general. We drew inspiration from the limited supply of books available at the college then. Teachers like A.C.K.Raja who had a sharp political outlook understood and supported the students and helped to formulate our own social, political and aesthetic perspectives.
All this was made possible because of the close bondage we shared. Almost all of us were staying at the hostel, living and spending our entire time with each other. The sense of fraternity was great. May be, at that time, none of us ever thought at any time we’d have to think, act and live life as lonely individuals. The sense of security and warmth provided by being within such a group was great.
Even after finishing the course from Thiruvananthapuram, I spent a couple of years just roaming around all over Kerala. May be, the phase of confusion might have already started to set in. After graduation, I’d tried for higher studies at Santiniketan, but failed to get admission. So, the wanderings started. I did some commissioned works here and there, and portraits of some people, some odd jobs… it went on till prompted by some friends, I decided to try M.S.University. I got admission and moved over to Baroda. By this time I was married and my daughter was born while I was in Baroda. The rise and fall of the Indian Radical Painters and Sculptors Association happened during those years. The period of the Group’s existence had also given all of us an intoxicating sense of togetherness. But, once the Group ceased to exist following the suicide of Krishnakumar, in 1989, it was a total vacuum that faced all of us. For me, at least, that was the case.
RK: Those events, especially the suicide of Krishnakumar and the subsequent disbanding of the Group, seem to have left a deep mark on many artists who have associated with it. Many were silent for almost one decade. Was it the same with you?
Reghu: Yes, his death had made a deep wound in me, because he was a dear friend. I had returned to Kerala, as part of the Group’s decision to go back home and work from there. But, once the Group had ceased to be, you were left with the responsibility of taking decisions for yourself. You had to take upon the charge of your own life. You were left alone as an individual, taking upon a hostile society that was indifferent towards artists. There was no one to show you the way out. All had resorted to their own individual paths. Those were trying time. I was rather trying to find a proper course of navigation.
RK: Your re-entry, let me term it ‘re-entry’ itself, into the Indian contemporary art circuit happened with ‘Double- Enders.’ Your works in the ‘Double- Enders’ were much appreciated and they were collected by the major collectors of India. What was the process that led from that earlier vacuum to this phase?
Reghu: ‘Double-Enders’ was a challenge, in many ways. It was a watershed event for the art scene in Kerala, especially for many artists who were working from Kerala, including me. And, the time it happened was just ripe, for many of us.
I had already moved to Kochi from Punaloor, my native place, for a couple of years when Bose Krishnamachari came up with the idea of ‘Double-Enders.’ By that time, things had started happening, after a long hiatus. Many of my contemporaries, who had stopped working, had resumed painting and sculpting again. Some of our young friends, including Rajan and Zakkir Hussain, had returned to Kerala after the studies at Baroda, determined to work from here rather than go seeking their fortunes outside. The art scene in Kochi had started to change. A few catalyzing forces, so integral to the development of the present art scene, was beginning to function, like the Kashi Art Café. With Bose’s ‘De-curating’ held at Durbar Hall and the ‘Bombayx17’ curated by him at Kashi Art Gallery, a communication channel had opened between Kerala and Mumbai.
However, things were not smooth for me in the beginning. I had moved to Kochi at the insistence of friends. I had no idea what I should do in Kochi. I was not sure that support could be found for doing my works. The times were more conducive to painting than sculpture, I was told by many. Even potential sculptors were moving to painting.
By the time ‘Double-Enders’ happened, I was working at Kakkathuruthu, a small island in Alappuzha district, where the Kashi Art Retreat was just taking shape. Anoop Scaria and Dorrie Younger (of Kashi) had arranged for me to stay and work at the Art Retreat. The presence of other artists, like Rajan, N.N.Mohandas and Sosa, Zakkir Hussain and many others who had moved to Kochi, and occasional visits of Alex Mathew and Rimzon, gave good motivation. After a long break, I was again experiencing the presence of fellow artists, supporting each other, criticizing and questioning each other’s work. That sense of collective feeling that was integral to the times of the Group could be felt, though in a totally different way.
But, during the initial period, I couldn’t do much work. No images were coming. A totally dry spell. Then came ‘Double-Enders,’ and the need to meet the challenge of exhibiting with about 70 artists, putting up your work amidst some 140 works of art. Like every artist, I too wanted my work to have its place in the show.
I decided to do the human figure, something I was comfortable with. From the college days, I was adept in doing human and animal figures. Rajan, as you remember my works that remained in the Thiruvananthapuram college campus. There must have been something in them that forced others to let them remain there. And to remember them long after by the younger generation, like you do. So I had to begin from where I had dropped off almost two decades ago.
RK :Your works for the present show include figures, odd human beings carrying an absurd amount of baggage, in absurd and rather vulnerable postures. There is a sharp humour live in all of them. And they even look a bit self-critical!
Reghu: While conceiving the present body of works, I was not too bothered by the subject. I was interested more in forms. Of course, there was a thread of thought, triggered by the common sights around and the very personal responses. There were basically disgust, anger, hatred, revulsion… at the revolting sights that surround us. Like people carrying ridiculous baggages. Eating voraciously, drinking heavily and throwing up everywhere… such disgusting acts. But I wanted to explore portraying the dirty acts of human beings possibly attractive. Just to explore the paradox. As if in a performance.
RK: Like the gory death becoming a fascinating sight at the hands of master performers of Kudiyattam. And, your work at the ‘Double Enders,’ was titled ‘Performer ?’ And one of the works in this show is titled ‘Confession’!
Reghu: Yes, it has been true. So, I wanted to take a look, a contemptuous, yet critical look, which encompassed my own self as I also belong among these human beings. And, for me, this is only the beginning stage of a process, which I hope, is to continue long.
RK : Reghu, these days, the Malayali artists are getting a lot of attention at the national level. How do you view this phenomenon, compared to the earlier days?
Reghu : Of course, artists born in Kerala, who speak Malayalam, are becoming national figures. But, interestingly, I am noticing that they are not being labeled as Malayali or South Indian artists anymore. They are being identified just by their names, without any regional tags. Even K.C.S.Panikker was not lucky in this regard, I think. He was never given the deserving attention at the national level as he was regarded a South Indian artist. In Madras, he was a Malayali artist. And for Malayalis, he was an artist who lived in Madras.
As for me, though I am working and showing in Kerala at present, my works are not addressing an exclusively Malayali viewership, but a wider audience spread over the national or even international levels. With the vastly improved communication system, an artist exhibiting in Kochi should expect a viewership spread out all over India or even abroad. Unlike literature or even cinema, the visual arts are not limited within the boundaries of the spoken language. I am not alone working for a large, local audience, but for a small audience which may be spread out all over the world.
(Courtesy: Kashi Art Gallery, Kochi)
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