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Defining limits of creativity

Photo: Vipin Chandran

Creatively inclined Chitra Sudhakaran is all set to take off on a new artistic journey literally and figuratively

Chitra Sudhakaran, at 18, is an artist in the making without the attendant ‘artistic’ airs. Her candour is refreshing when she says “I appreciate Raja Ravi Varma and Van Gogh, although their styles are very different, show life in a different way.” A joint exhibition of paintings by Balashree Chitra Sudhakaran and Nithin K. Satheesan called ‘Rococo’ will open today at the Ernakulam Press Club, and will be on till August 22.

Chitra received the Balashree for creative arts in 2003 from the then President Dr. A. P. J. Abdul Kalam. For those who are wondering what a Balashree Award is, the award is also termed the Padmashree Award for children. There are four award categories – creative writing, creative science, creative arts and creative performances. To qualify for the award, Chitra had to compete at the State level, followed by zonal and then national competitions. For the national level competition she had to compete with the best creative minds of the country in her category and come up tops.

Chitra paints and sculpts, and she has not limited herself to any single medium – acrylic, oils, water colours – are just some of them. Although she prefers painting nature, she experiments with surrealism, realism and others.

So what does she think of contemporary Indian artists, say someone like M. F. Husain, and she is forthright about her lack of experience, “I am just starting out, I do not have the experience to comment on eminent artists. But about M. F. Husain’s work, I can relate to some of them, but some I cannot.” A former student of the Seventh Day Adventist School, Thrissur, Chitra is headed to Ananda University of Living Wisdom in California for her higher studies. She will spend four years there. She will be on scholarship to study art, more precisely Inspirational Art. Chitra attended a summer camp at the Ananda University when she was in Class 8, “I spent 40 days there, I was in touch with my art teacher there and that is how I came to know of the scholarship.”

The only child of her parents, Chitra says her mother, a teacher, was supportive right from the start but “my father had some reservations initially, but now they have been set to rest.” Her father, who is an engineer in the Gulf wanted his daughter to follow in his footsteps and become an engineer, which is why she opted for the science stream for her Plus Two. “One day, while I was surfing the Net, I came across some literature on engineering which is when I realised what all it entailed. I promptly dropped Math and that was the end of any hopes of a career as an engineer,” laughs Chitra.

Chitra has fond memories of the Balashree competitions in New Delhi in 2003. The participants had to do whole lot activities that involved creative thinking and application as well. “We had a great deal of fun, we had to do finger painting, clay modelling, painting a wall…Then there was an activity where we had to choose a fable form the Panchatantra and make a model of it using garbage. I chose the story of the lion and the rabbit. I used thermocol, grass, hay, used bottles and whole lot of waste materials,” she says.

When President Kalam gave her the award, he is said to have told her that getting an award was not enough, the winners should think in terms of giving something back to society, serving society. The reason why she gave all the proceeds from the sale of her paintings from first exhibition to charity, a share of the proceeds from this exhibition too will go to charity.

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