Vyjayanthimala clad in an incandescent green saree teases a glance as a fish bowl and its silvery-gold inhabitants in the background stand witness. This canvas is signed: M Ramalingam. An archetype of 1980s Tamil cinema and its dramatic allure, this frame frozen in paint, speaks volumes: of a glorious time of hand-drawn skills that later morphed into the thriving industry of calendar art in South India. Ramalingam was one of its most prolific stars.
Today, in the bylanes of the dusty, metro work-laden Arcot Road in Chennai is Chithiraalayam, an unassuming gallery brimming with familiar canvases and prints. By familiar, I don’t mean in the style of Razas and Husains. Rather, it is the kind of familiarity you associate with a dear object at home that you have known for decades. In the gallery are many ‘saami padams’ (as they were known in the 1940s) by some of the stalwarts and pioneers of the calendar art industry, all hailing from the school of C Kondiah Raju. Think Muruga with a smile on his face against a glittery backdrop, and other Hindu gods and goddesses, apart from scenes from popular Indian mythology like that of the churning of the ocean.
Chithiraalayam is a study on this school of artists that never got its due and of an industry that faded around the end of the 20th Century. A part of the collection is on display today at DakshinaChitra, as an ode to its forgotten masters.
