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Once upon a time there was a Raju…

Photos : K. Ramesh Babu

Space of his own Poosapati Parameshwar Raju inside the Kalahita gallery

Give him a swizzle stick and you can easily mistake Poosapati Parameshwar Raju for a serving brigadier or a retired soldier, with his twirling salt and pepper moustache, commanding presence and gait. However, you are more likely to spot Raju in a cor ner room of the Kalahita Art Gallery with easel, paint brush and a pot of red paint or a digital SLR; and when he clasps and unclasps his hands, or moves them expansively to make a point, and speaks in a quiet whisper, it’s clear that Raju is not a soldier but an artist.

It is an accident of life that Parameshwar Raju is an artist and not a solider: “I hail from a martial family and did my schooling in a Sainik School but it came undone when I went trekking in Garhwal. Beyond Gangotri, I had a bad fall and it took a week before I could get medical attention and my soldierly ambitions crumbled,” says Raju.

That was in 1978. Thirty years down the line, Raju is the moving force behind the Kalahita Art Foundation. “I realised that Indian art is not documented at all. We have no sense of history. Our artists are arrogant and don’t maintain records or date their paintings.

As a first step we want to document all Andhra art forms. Cherial and Kalamkari were temple art forms, which is no longer the case now. We want to document it and put it in public domain,” says Raju.

Kalahita is a distinct gallery, with its sprawl of space and brilliant lighting; in contrast, other galleries appear like transformed two-room houses. Life has been an intertwining strand of art and gallantry for the Raju family as well as for Parameshwar Raju (the family name Poosapati can be traced back to Bobbili Yudham and to another hoary era where territorial squabbles were frequent). “Once I took my grandfather to Ajanta and Ellora, and he wanted to know what the paintings meant. After listening to me, he patted me and gave his explanation right from the preparation of the wall to the painting on the wall. He was the one who told me about the glorious past of the family, which our parents never revealed to us so that we stay grounded in reality,” says Raju. The next thing was Raju’s discovery and exploration of the traditional Indian design grid. “Unlike the western grid, our system works with a dot in the middle. Divide it and we have the five elements. The dot expands to form Shakti, is modified into a triangle, Shiva. It is a pulsating grid of creativity unlike the static western grid,” says Raju. For those who came in late, Raju’s work mostly comprises of calligraphy, where he uses the central dot as a pivot around which he weaves the magic of his spiritual and artistic training.

Now, Parameshwar Raju is using his training on packaging and giving a new fillip to the art world beyond the walls of loaded connoisseurs. In an earlier role, he was part of the team at Mudra that ushered in packaging revolution with Dhara groundnut oil and other vegetable oils under the direction of Dr Verghese Kurian at NDDB. “The small packages weeded out adulterators and revolutionised packaging in India,” he says.

A few weeks back, Raju used his knowledge and understanding of packaging to transform some of the works of Thota Vaikuntam into merchandise. “Our packaging is a let down as it lacks sophistication and finesse. What we tried to do was raise the standards and make it really usable,” says Raju.

“Right now I am working on metal and textiles,” he says, as he unfolds a piece of cloth with a Ganesh in red done in Ikat. “I have drawn the idol and the weavers have executed it on cloth.” He takes out a box, and says, “This is checks and crosses with a difference; instead of a 4X4 grid, I have a 3X3 with one set made of brass and another of copper. Right now I am working on designs etched on stone that will be displayed horizontally and not vertically.”

And in this idea of unconventional display, one can decipher the thought process of the artist is not afraid to bridge the gap between commercial and fine art.

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