The document provides an overview and analysis of an art exhibition by painter Shaji Appukuttan titled "Karuna- A Painter's Query". The exhibition features a collection of Shaji's paintings exploring themes of impermanence, detachment from sensory objects, and the presence of spiritual figures. The author analyzes various paintings and their subjects in detail, concluding the exhibition shares a vulnerable moment of the artist's internal creative process centered around the concept of "Karuna" or compassion.

1. Karuna- A Painter’s Query
SHOW #4 JULY 10th
-JULY 31st
‘Untitled', 167cm x 70cm, Watercolor on canson paper, 2016
Solo Show of Paintings by Shaji Appukuttan
Curated by Radha Gomaty

3. Karuna- A Painter’s Query [On the works of Shaji Appukuttan]
“vayadhammā saṅkhārā appamādena sampādetha”
‘All compounded things, all experiences (mental and physical), all phenomena by their very nature decay and
die, and are (therefore) disappointing: it is through being not-blind-drunk on, obsessed by, or infatuated with,
the objects of the senses that you succeed in awakening, or obtain liberation.’
-The Buddha’s Last Address.
This insight, that has been realized profoundly, thoroughly examined, explored and mapped by the Seers,
momentarily sprang to mind as I glimpsed a tiny painting of a rusted old ship amongst Shaji Appukuttan’s
work on display at Durbar Hall art gallery some months ago. I also instantly recognized its physical
location. A small ship breaking yard tucked away in a desolately beautiful pocket of rural Kannur where
three rivers confluence in their last slow passage to the Arabian Sea; Decommissioned sailing vessels stand
anchored there, bows turned towards the distant waves, biding their time for their end under the
demolition hammers; The parts collected, sorted and consigned to the roar of the furnace’s Fire -This is
Man’s way of engining their cycle of rebirth into repeated servitude, into newer forms of efficacious
usefulness; for they can never be restored to their original sleep of Ore in the innards of Earth.
The change wrought by human agency is sometimes irreversible.
In the early Brick kiln series of paintings and drawings Man is not shown but only his handiwork -Here, the
most basic transmutation of Earth, the fertile clayey topsoil, cradle of the life of the plants, into the first ever
‘pucca’ construction material unit -‘brick’ created with his new found control of the physical element of fire.
In one of the later Kiln series paintings however, suddenly a man appears. He is lying supine amongst the
bricks he has made. He is fast asleep.

4. In sleeping, Man is not ‘active’ or ‘constructive’.
Through the appropriate rhythmic movement of
the tides of Prana, that subtle current that is both
cause and sustainer of Life, he is freed everyday for
a few hours from his relentless drive to compound
together newer and newer things for the perusal
of his brief waking existence of Day [Active and
Conscious], a small interval between the sleep of
Night [Passive & Unconscious] and the dream of
dawn and twilight [Subconscious and in-between].
‘Untitled', 152cm x 92cm, Acrylic on canvas, 2015
‘Untitled', 167cmx 70cm, Watercolor on paper, 2015

5. It is said that the worldly man’s day is the Seer’s
[Yogi’s] Night and his night, the Seer’s [Yogi’s] day.
In the next painting, the sleeping man has disap-
peared and Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa’s image
makes its appearance, ethereal and slightly
airborne amongst the bricks stacked in the kiln.
Seers make their appearance in different ways now
in Shaji’s paintings. In the left canvas of a diptych,
upon a ground overrun by green, a mother cow
grazes with her suckling calf-a self absorbed
harmonious dyad blending seamlessly into the
surroundings. In the right canvas Ramana partly
sits, partly floats like an ethereal vision. Even if He
does not blend with Nature directly, His presence
embodies the simple naked innocence of the
cow-calf dyad in a manner that can be compared only with how a note, played at a higher octave,
harmonises perfectly well with the same note played but on a lower scale. It is this quality of ambivalence
which the portrayal of the Seers exude-of both Being here and simultaneously ‘not-being’ here that
assumes significance. Their painted physical presence is suggestive of an abode in which something
profoundly indwells but only briefly, like a tenant on a short tenure.
So it seems but natural that in Shaji’s creative process the place of the Seers is taken up by the image of
a House, as if from some other time-simple yet spacious and marked with an unostentatiously stark kind
of grandeur even, with its white washed walls and over hanging roof of thatched coconut fronds.
‘Untitled' 90cm x 69cm
Dry pastel, Tea wash, Watercolor, 2015

7. ’Untitled', 244cmx 92cm, Acrylic on canvas, 2016

8. It is placed also, curiously, at the extreme left upper corner of a large canvas foregrounded by a grove
of mangrove trees. The House vibrates with a similar intensity of presence, though muted, like that of
the Seers. The house in the painting, Shaji informed me after I went on this inner journey of words in
response to its presence, is the ancestral home of the iconoclast social reformer Sahodaran Ayyappan
(21 August 1889 - 6 March 1968). Abundantly blessed by Swami Vaakbhataananda in his early college
days at Malabar Christian College in Calicut and later Sree Narayana Guru and also Poet
Kumaranaasaan, he carried out a bold agenda to break existing caste disparities by organizing inter-
communal joint dining(Mishrabhojanam). The House is preserved today at Cherai by the Muziris
Heritage museum.
In the later works there is no particular
place demarcated by a specific single
image for that ‘note on the higher
octave’. All there is is Ground … Endless
earth. Not the primeval scenic luxuriance
of a forest but just earth ... Land left out,
left to itself, perhaps in that interval of
being briefly overlooked by the long
hands of our kind driven by an insatiable
appetite for appropriation and occupa-
tion.
Shaji’s later paintings are like these tracts
that separate villages or small towns from
one another that one passes through for
a stretch of hours while travelling in
trains. There small ponds, undisturbed, ‘Sahodaran Ayyappan Bhavanam’, 122cmx 92cm, Acrylic on canvas, 2016

9. open their eyes to sky and tangles of creepers quietly disseminate through their spread the eventless
story of a form of silent Life, not seen nor heard by the usual run of humankind. The entire air is now
suffused with this quality of brief indwelling.
The small water colors fill the gaps.
They are like stills in a movie edited together by these connecting word-lines while attempting to trace
the mind of a painter. Looking at these small works are like looking at a fast cut montage of a
crisscrossing mental process just as the movie is about to end.
While the Mountain is Arunachala, Ramana’s abode, the Turtle, symbol of Pratyaahara or the withdrawal
of the senses from the outer world as pre requisite to Dhyaana or Inner Contemplation, painfully
stretches out all its limbs and twisting its neck, looks up in askance at the sky. The backdrop is arid. Have
all the small ponds been filled or have they dried? The universal gift of life-giving water… How has it been
denied?
‘Karuna’, 30cmx 30cm,
Watercolor & Graphite on paper, 2016
‘Karuna; 30cmx 30cm,
Watercolor & Graphite on paper, 2016

10. Shaji brings in a new device into some of these works-the written Word. The same one or the same set
of words repeated like a mantra in the backdrop of specific image.
Sneham or Love behind the innocent peacefully relaxed form of Ramana in His loincloth sitting still with
outstretched legs, Dhyaanam or Contemplation behind a beautifully painted donkey, its back only
metaphorically loaded with a drawing of a stack of books, Once upon a time behind the painting of an
Uppan or Crow Pheasant, a commonly sighted much loved bird in Kerala, Unclouded behind a worker
spooning in a bowl of gruel and Compassion behind a solemn Narayana Guru in His iconic seated
posture.
What is the meaning of the word Com-passion?
It means to suffer with or experience with. The state of
‘in-feeling with’ implied by the word Em-pathy, a form of
a response that coalesces into an abiding attitude
expressed by the word Com-passion. Its Sanskrit equiva-
lent Karuna, is that one Guna or ‘quality’ that abides like
a Light purified by the wisdom of non attachment and
dispassion in a liberated being, otherwise free of all
karma, all gunas and the binding of all the dualities and
passions. It is Karuna that prompts the intervention of
Grace upon one who has reached her/his wit’s end in
suffering and has thrown her/his hands up in complete
surrender. The way IT acts is in a manner way beyond the
good offices of philanthropy or the well meant zeal of
social activistic reform even as all these too, at times, can
be IT’s vehicles…
‘Karuna’, 30cmx 30cm,
Watercolor & Graphite on paper, 2016

11. –Radha Gomaty
July 2016
Radha Gomaty is a visual artist trained at Faculty of Fine Arts, Baroda and Kalabhavan,
Santhiniketan. She is a Poet, an Educator and also runs an all- women rural upcycling
initiative called SangMitra that creatively re-works Textile waste.
But wait. We are talking about a Painter here. As Shaji queried in monologue, “What can a Painter do?”
And answered himself “…Paint…He can only Paint.”
Let us ask now what a painting can do ...
When birthed from true intention and the fearlessness to enter experiential enquiry into the ways of
Karuna, it may be that in some rare moment of engagement the reach of the brush may go a just a little
beyond the realm the drives of the Mind-body and Emotion-body complexes that Art as a practice and
as an expression is usually confined to. When that happens the image sings. Even the image of a new
shoot quietly thrusting its green enlivening verticality through the apparently lifeless horizontals of
pruned branches left to dry in a lopped heap upon the ground attains the lyrical sanctity of a quiet
everyday revelation.
This show is marked by a certain generosity in that the artist is actually sharing with the world a
vulnerable moment of an internal process at work. Karuna or Com-passion is the title Shaji is considering
for this showing of his works. I am going to leave Shaji there now in silence standing at that limpid
clearing where many a possible path opens before him.
May he be walked through the one that harmonizes best with his heart’s truest intentions …

12. ‘Karuna’, 30cmx 30cm,
Watercolor & Graphite on paper, 2016
‘Karuna’, 30cmx 30cm,
Watercolor & Graphite on paper, 2016

13. Born on 1969, Guruvayur, Kerala
Education :
1985-1990: Studied at Govt. Fine Arts College Trissur
Work History:
1992: State award from Kerala Lalithakala Akademy
1992, 1994- Grand from Kerala Lalithakala Akademy for solo shows
1994- Grand from Kerala Sahithya Akademy for travel and research
Solo Exhibitions:
1992: Guruvayur library hall –sposored by kerala lalitha kala akademy
1994: Lalithakala Akademy art gallery Kozhikkode- sposored by Kerala Lalithakala Akademy
1997: Ernakulam – Durbarhall gallery
2015: Ernakulam – Durbarhall B gallery
2016: White wall Art gallery Palarivattom – Ernakulam, curated by Radha Gomaty
Group Exhibitions:
1993: Regional art exhibition, Chennai
2004: Epiques art gallery Delhi – curated by Roy Thomas
2007: ‘Elephant‘- the group show at red frog art gallery, Thekkady
2013: “SMALL IS BIG” the group show curated by Anoop Kamath - Ernakulam Durbarhall gallery
Worked for the film ‘cotton marrie’ directed by Ismael Marchant
Currently practicing at Ernakulam And Bangalore
Shaji Appukuttan

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