When the outbreak of the pandemic affected his livelihood, Shiju Ellora did not lose heart.
Instead, the makeup and tattoo artist from Beypore turned his attention to his interest in crafting.
A miniature uru that adorns his drawing room is the result of his artistic pursuit during the lockdown and is winning him accolades.
Mr. Shiju made the uru , traditional ships for which Beypore is renowned the world over, using the midrib of coconut leaves ( eerkkil ). “I started working on the uru six months ago. The finishing works were done recently,” he said.
He used around 55,000 eerkkil , carefully polished, for the purpose. The uru , in four storeys, is about 4.5-feet-long, two-feet-wide and 2.5-feet-high. Ornamental lights have been added to the structure.
Mr. Shiju has made several such attempts in the past. An exhibition of his sculptures made using sawdust was held at the Kerala Lalithakala Akademi Art Gallery in Kozhikode a few years ago.
He used matchsticks to create miniatures of the Eiffel Tower, the Burj Khalifa and the Leaning Tower of Pisa.
One of his sculptures of Vaikom Muhammad Basheer on a single piece of wood now adorns the writer’s home ‘Vailalil’ in Beypore.
“I have enough art pieces at home to set up an art gallery of my own. It is my dream now,” said Mr. Shiju, adding that he would like to impart knowledge of the craft to children through the gallery.
At present, the artist is in the process of exploring another medium, newspaper, for his next sculpture of a dragon and an eagle.
