Cholamandal: An open question

The late sculptor S Nandagopal would insist that there was no place like Cholamandal. “Where else can you find a self-reliant artist community like ours? Which other community has built its own museum?” Aside of Ein Hod, an artists’ village in Israel founded in 1953, there are few parallels of a community as envisioned by Nandagopal’s father, KCS Paniker (1911-77), a pioneering force of the Madras Movement. It’s hard to imagine these 10 acres as sparse vegetation when Paniker established Cholamandal in May 1966. Prolific clumps of bougainvillea in bright magenta and paper-white bloom under the hot sun this first weekend of February. There is a buzz at the Cholamandal Centre for Contemporary Art, which opened in 2009 with a museum and two galleries — Laburnum and Indigo. Largely steered by Nandagopal, the museum collection has works of 55 artists associated with the Madras Movement, including important figures outside of the Village such as Alphonso Arul Doss, C Dakshinamoorthy, KM Adimoolam and RM Palaniappan.

At Open Studio 2018, 30 artists open their studios to the public for the first time in Cholamandal’s history. Families with children, even toddlers, amble around. The atmosphere, conducive to informal exchanges, offers first-hand insight into working processes, materials used and challenges faced. The lively exchanges between artists and visitors prompts the dialogue ‘Can Cholamandal enter a new phase?’

Be my guest: For the first time in the history of Cholamandal, 30 artists opened their studios to the public for two days early last month.

Birth and growth

Paniker insisted on the purchase of a plot of land in order to become a member. “Looking back, I realise his grand vision in the 1960s. He could see far ahead, how bonds form amongst people who have ownership to a place,” says Latha G, daughter of founder member KS Gopal (1938-89), adding, “if Paniker had not insisted, my father would not have bought a plot!” Of the original 30, 13 founders remain. Membership (currently 29) at Cholamandal is restricted to founders and their children, and Latha is now a member. Newcomers have to either rent or buy plots. Over time, new artists are absorbed into the community. They are permitted to display works at the Indigo and Laburnum galleries; some are also showing at Open Studio 2018.

The founders’ philosophy was to make crafts for survival, but now artists at Cholamandal concentrate purely on practice. There is a sense of pride in every studio I visit, tables laid out with prints, sculptures poised between cactuses and wooden logs — art in natural surrounds. Anita Panneerselvan, a resident and art-lover hosting a photo-show with four photographers from outside, says, “This is a fresh opportunity for us. The reason I am excited is because it is fresh and interesting, and you constantly need to juxtapose different arts against each other and conversations spike up. Artists who sometimes have not been included in the past are a part. This time we start with a spirit of inclusiveness.”

Of time and place

At P Gopinath’s airy studio, he remembers the days when he would lie under a thatched roof, listening to owlets chatter night-long. Even now the air is relaxed, so much so the pi-dogs dozing at the narrow turn don’t move even when my car gets close. It’s this lull that sculptor PS Nandhan loves about the Village. Nandhan (born 1940) felt constrained at having to visualise, looking for a natural and automatic way of making art. He starts from the base, saying, “A tree always takes root before it starts to grow.” He graduated to granite from clay, looking for a more permanent medium. “With practice, working with granite is just like drawing on paper. It’s like clay, only takes longer,” says Nandhan, whose sculptures can take six months to a year to complete. His ‘Shunya’ at the gallery is a faceless Buddha, reflecting our state of mind at any moment.

‘Shunya’ , by sculptor PS Nandhan sujatha shankar kumar

Moving from these veterans, I meet third-generation Shailesh BO, now 48, who moved here in 1997, and Maria Antony Raj, 55.

Eventually Shailesh set up his studio in eminent painter SG Vasudev’s compound. Wooden figures in multiple poses are strewn around, his explorations of yogic postures. Here, under a canopy of trees, 10 years back, Shailesh made a model for his painting study. Then, he realised sculpture could be his medium. Challenged by senior artists to do something unique, Shailesh brought in 3D printing technology where 1,800 layers rendered through Maya software is translated into a sculpture. ‘Klimt on me’, his first-born, has a screen print heat-transferred to the cubic-foot sized body. Since then, he has made and sold 40 such sculptures.

Reclusive artist Maria is known for his departures from the norm. I walk into his sculpture yard at the edge of the commune and stumble upon his anthill-like clay installation ‘City of Beasts’, depicting the unplanned growth of cities, which won the National Award in 1993. Maria explores the human condition, placing it in context with recent events and changes, primarily using mobiles. His ‘Nature on a Bubble’, suspended shiny silver balls with trees, depicts the fate of over a lakh trees uprooted during Cyclone Vardah.

A spirit of return, challenge and exchange

Artists like C Douglas moved to Germany and returned, while several live in other cities, going to and fro, bringing in influences from elsewhere. At the Open Studio we get to visit artists who are not full-time residents here. Every Chennai winter, paper artist Nadine Tarbouriech comes down with founding member V Vishwanadhan from Paris to spend time at their studio here. Tarbouriech is excited about 30 artists showing for Open Studio and says, “We do it in France and I thought it would be nice to have one here.” Their neighbour, S Paramasivan, who lives in the US, says, “In Vashon Island, I can put my copper sheets out in the yard and no one will take them!” Quite contrarily, Nandhan, whose first major commission was for a client in Sriharikota in 1979, recalls, “I created a 14-ft-long copper sculpture called ‘Earth Bond’. I was going to weld the parts the next day, but when I came to the open workshop the next morning, I found all the material had been stolen.” Nandhan had to sell a part of his plot at Cholamandal to repay the bank loan of ₹40,000, a huge sum those days.

Straight from Paris: Nadine Tarbouriech with her paintings

“When Cholamandal was begun, we had no money for many things. Paniker had the idea to make crafts with skills and live. I started by making metal craft,” says Paramasivam, who moved to Seattle in 1973 when he married visiting storyteller Cathy Spagnoli. Now at 75, the sculptor is looking forward to spending time in his newly-built home and studio here. His ‘Kite’, inspired by the Japanese kite, is made of diamond-shaped modules of bent copper sheet bolted together. Taking his cue from American sculptor Alexander Calder — who made his 25-m long ‘L’Araignée Rouge’ in six panels for easier transportation to Paris in 1975 — Paramasivam started to assemble his own sculptures in parts. At the entrance, he has displayed two dwarapalakas . A vertical rod goes through the rhomboidal sheet metal forms at the rear. At the bottom, a three-pronged stand comes together with three clamps. “All my sculptures come apart. That’s how I could make them in America and bring them back here. In a suitcase!” he adds.

On the roadmap

From here, where next? A The New York Times article of 1998 carried an extensive article on Cholamandal artists as ‘pioneers of modernism’. From the third generation of artists, Shailesh echoes this sentiment. “The neo-tantric movement started here with KV Haridasan. Living together started here!” Haridasan’s first show, ‘Yantra’ was at the British Council, Madras in 1968, even before the tantric movement shaped in Delhi, with him a central influencer. In 1985, the UCLA’s gallery had a curated show of eight tantric painters including Paniker and Haridasan, with the LA Times carrying a critical article. Known for strength of line work, the art of Madras Movement — ranging from figurative to abstract with elements of folk, metaphysical, tantric and the enigmatic ‘words and symbols’ — defies easy categorisation. In Mumbai, when a group of these artists showed in 1991, critic SV Vasudev coined the phrase Madras Metaphor and that, perhaps, is the common thread we see in their diverse expressions.

In April 2017, within months of Nandagopal launching the book on Paniker, a painting from the iconic artist’s Words and Symbols series sold for ₹1.8 crore — the top bid at Osian’s auction. This year, works by master artists Douglas and Paniker were shown at the India Art Fair. The National Museum in Delhi is showing works of the Madras Movement from its own collection.

The banyan, a seedling plant when Cholamandal began, is now a gigantic tree — likewise, the community too has spread its roots. A destination on the tourist map, Cholamandal gets many international visitors. “Dutch visitors are happy to see sculptures by Netherlands artists in the garden,” says Latha G. “It began with Paniker’s students and colleagues 51 years ago. Our families have bonded since then. I have every belief our generation will take it forward.”

Sujatha Shankar Kumar is a writer and visualiser based in Chennai