: Painter and cultural personality M.V. Devan, who died on Tuesday, maintained strong ties with Kochi and its suburbs from his early days as an artist.
Though he chose Mahe to set up the Malayala Kalagramam a la the Cholamandalam Artists’ Village founded by his guru and master painter K.C.S. Panicker, he was instrumental in enlivening the cultural life of Kochi for the last three decades of the last century.
M.K.K. Nayar, who was much more than an able administrator, brought him to be associated with FACT Engineering and Design organisation (Fedo), for which he was to aesthetically design buildings. “Devan was a bit hesitant to take it up, as he was not a trained architect. However, Nayar’s faith in him was firm, which gave us some brilliantly designed structures on the campus, especially the guesthouse overlooking the Periyar,” says writer and columnist K.N. Shaji, a regular at Kerala Kalapeetom, an art learning centre founded by Devan in Ernakulam.
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Kalapeetom introduced some best-known artists like Kanayi Kunhiraman and C.N. Karunakaran (both permanent faculty members) besides artists Namboodiri and K.P. Soman as instructors. The centre was initially operating from rented premises at Pulleppady, but later got shifted to Valanjambalam and to a house with an expansive courtyard at Karikkamuri Crossroads.
“Artist T. Kaladharan’s father, Narayana Menon a.k.a Nanappa Menon, offered to accommodate the centre when the Valanjambalam building was vacated. I was still a student, but the heyday of Kalapeetom saw it organise almost on a daily basis intellectual discussions, interactions with top artists, writers like Sivarama Karanth, and performances by theatre groups and the like. From music bands Osibisa and Girlschool to theatre personalities like Narendra Prasad and Murali; poets A. Ayyappan and D. Vinayachandran; and storywriter T. Padmanabhan, several eminent personalities and groups graced the intellectually stimulating evenings at Kalapeetom,” says Mr. Shaji.
And, the force that brought them all was Devan master. Kalapeetom continues to exist, in the form of the Nanappa Art gallery, named after ‘Nanappa Menon’, artist kaladharan’s late father.
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