Born in Palghat district, Kerala in 1945, Achuthan Kudallur, who holds a diploma in Civil Engineering, wanted to be a writer at first. Later, the canvas and its colours drew him towards serious painting. The artist grew up in an atmosphere charged with Gandhian values, the writings of Ramakrishna and Vivekananda. His values and views are well depicted in some of his paintings, which are a joyous, riotous spread of colours. And yet some are melancholic, even tragic.
Abstraction BrownFor Achuthan, painting is not a dialogue or a conversation, but a communion with colour. His works display a remarkable economy of style and grace. His paintings are of a non-figurative style and the medium he uses is oil. Achutan’s art is at once exciting, energetic, yet strangely tranquil. For the viewer, to view, is to invite a kind of haunting.
Inspired by nature and landscapes, his paintings, of Kerala villages, beaches and evenings at the temple, reinforce his belief that remembering implies reinventing. Achuthan says “With a certain nostalgia, I remember the smell of the expressionist paint spread over my canvas in the seventies. I painted in that style because, with my way of looking at the world at that time, there was no other way out. What I do now with the colour is not a logical extension of those pictures, but a confession that such story telling does not necessarily make a picture”.
Abstraction Blue Achuthan does not have a count of his works. Once he starts painting it goes on, because his constant worry is of time passing by. With a pleasant smile on his face he says, “Sometimes at midnight, I get up and ask how old I am… in the 30s or 40s?”
Besides being rated as one of the India’s topmost artists, Kudallur has a huge collection of portrait and illustrations for his own stories, which have been published in prominent fortnightly magazines.
Water ColourA recipient of the National Academy Award and Tamil Nadu Lalit Kala Akademi Award, the artist is a widely travelled person. Apart from sixteen solo shows all over India, sponsored by major art galleries and institutions, he has been part of most important juried and curated group exhibitions, such as Sothebys India sale in London, New South Delfina Gallery, London, Homage to Arthur Rimbaud in India and France and Heart Intuitive Logic Exhibition.
He has had several Institutional commissions including Air India, Mumbai. His works are in several individual and institutional collections like the National Gallery of Modern Art, New Delhi, Air India, Glenberra Musuem, Japan, and with other collectors in India and abroad.
Address : Achuthan Kudallur,
#111, First Main Road, Worker’s Estate, Neelankarai, Chennai – 600 041
