Rhythm of ecstasy

Published in Weekend, 2006

By Francis P Barclay

Born in 1951 in Udmalpet, Manickavachagam did his schooling in Poolavadi village. His father, a goldsmith, was his first art teacher. He used to make sculptures and clay models and teach him. He had also played miruthangam and harmonium and his house was filled with music every night.
Though Manickavachagam has not learnt music, he has a fervour for it. That's why he never misses music concerts and classical dance programmes.
Even while working in the telephone department (he worked there for 16 years) he was conducting art exhibitions. He took BFA and post-graduate diploma in fine arts at the age of 30 and joined the Regional Engineering College (now National Institute of Technology), Trichy as a lecturer.
A recipient of several awards, he has conducted about 19 exhibitions so far and his collections are scattered across the world.

Are dance and music the ways to vent ecstasy? P Manickavachagam, lecturer in the Department of Architecture of the National Institute of Technology, Tiruchy will say `yes'. They are also the languages of joy, he will add.
That he is right will be the first reaction of a person who goes around the Kasthuri Sreenivasan Trust Art Gallery, watching the beauty of a set of tranquil expressions - `mudras' or the hand movements and `adavus' or the
leg movements of the traditional Indian dance styles - on the canvas. The rhythm of ecstasy, he calls them.
Manickavachagam calls his paintings a fusion of visual and performing art. ``Whatever may be the concept, an artiste will feel elated while presenting it in a sequence. An artist, too, will get the same ecstasy while portraying
the movements of hands and legs in canvas,'' he explains.
Though his paintings are in contemporary style, they are about the traditional Indian dance and music. He has contemplated on the cubic and surrealistic art styles in his paintings and experimented them with varied colour schemes.
His keen observation of the performers is portrayed in lines and expressive faces. ``Man would have started expressing joy through body movements and voice. Later, when these movements were coordinated and a grammar was laid down they turned out to be different forms of dance or music,'' he says.
It is a pleasure to fill the canvas with colours, but what makes it a absolute work is the balance, colour scheme, spatial arrangement and the rhythm. Manickavachagam's paintings speak a lot about them. Significantly, earthen colour schemes are incessant in his paintings.
The twisted torsos, broken limbs and the eloquent faces scattered in his paintings instill a sense of movement and rhythm.
The paintings are offered for sale.
The exhibition will be on till Monday from 10 am to 7 pm. For further details call 0422-2574110.