The Man Who Touched LaVA

Siju Thomas, the man who assists in mounting Bose Krishnamachari’s traveling project, LaVA, recounts his experiences with the project and a few lessons that he learned from the viewers/visitors.

Siju Thomas

Lava from an active volcano should be burning. Who can touch it? LaVA (Laboratory of Visual Arts) is equally a flow of burning pieces of knowledge. Here is a man who has touched it, experienced and moved around with on a 24x7 basis. Siju Thomas, an artist of his own right and a studio assistant of the artist-curator Bose Krishnamachari. Siju Thomas, since he passed out from Sir.J.J.School of Arts, Mumbai in 2002, has been working in the studio of Bose Krishnamachari, at times helping the artist in his practical affairs and at times working on his own works. He saw how LaVa took shape before his eyes. However, he did not know, he would be the man destined to carry it around the country.

“Bose Krishnamachari has been working on this project for a long time. Ever since I came to work with him, LaVa was there in his mind, it seems,” says a soft spoken Siju Thomas. But Bose had to engage himself with other projects in the mean time. “It took a lot of time from him. However, whenever he traveled he collected books for this project. He came back with them, made some mental patterns. And he spent a lot of time in designing the show. Design was an important part of the touring LaVa Project,” observes Siju.

Looking at the young students from the Fine Arts Faculty, M.S.University, Baroda, browsing through the books and videos available in LaVA, Siju feels that it is for the first time he sees so many students coming in when the guard opens the doors and leaving only when the impatient security man says ‘Its time guys.’ LaVA currently on at the Red Earth Galleries, ABS, Baroda had to revise its visiting times thanks to the onrush of students. “Initially the time was fixed between 4 pm and 7 pm. But many youngsters started coming in the morning itself. So the decision was made to keep the galleries open from 11 am to 7 pm,” says Siju.

Siju has now traveled four cities with LaVA. Right from packing to transporting, mounting to managing, Siju plays several roles. Has he grown tired of it? “No, I too try to see and read all what is available. But I cannot sit in one place and enjoy things as the visitors do. I move around, see whether someone is tampering with the materials etc. However taxing it is, I enjoy this experience,” Siju tells.

Managing the available space has always been a problem and challenge with LaVA. Then Bose and his team had to put together their brains to rearticulate the available space. In the Museum Gallery in Mumbai, where it was originally mounted, it was a classic case of perfection. Then it moved on to Kolkata, Bangalore and Kochi. “In Kochi, the show had to be put into two pieces as the space was inadequate to accommodate the books in one space itself. But splitting it into two gave a new physical experience to the viewer unlike the one that they got in other cities. In Kochi one had to go from one building to the other. It was like traversing through a huge library building. It worked well,” opines Siju Thomas.

What does Siju remember in LaVA? “For me, it is a total experience; may be an experience different from the viewer/visitor. I help in mounting and dismantling the show. I had to be very careful in handling the books and DVD players. I become a sort of museum assistant in these terms than a direct enjoyer of what is exhibited. There is a sense of detachment in this process.” For Siju, Baroda was the one station where people really came for going through all what is available. “In other places, people were mostly looking for a total experience. They flipped through so many things, but very few sat through. In Kochi lot of people visited the show, but there was a looming skepticism amongst the crowd. In Baroda, it is pure acceptance. Students come and their approach is quite earnest.”

Siju Thomas has to pack up LaVA for its last leg slated to take place in late February 2007 in New Delhi. Hosted by Bodhi, LaVA will be mounted in the unconventional spaces of Travancore Palace. “It would be a new challenge,” feels Siju and for him each challenge is a learning experience. Siju’s smiling face, one would not forget for the simple reason that you have seen so many smiling faces like his in the studios of the flourishing artists. They get experience by working with the young and established ones. And they wait for their day to come. They are the positive spirits from the shadow lines.