Thursday, June 29, 2017

Sitaram - The Portrait maker of Gods

Sitaram -  The Portrait maker of Gods
 By
P.R.Ramachander




God’s pictures are the treasured possession of most of the Hindus. They keep it with reverence in their prayer room. Most of the time we are not bothered to find, who painted it. For example I have been charmed by the Bala Krishna as well as Viswaroopa paintings of Guruvayurappan. I also reverentially look at and fold my hands, when I see the great painting of Puducode Annapoorneshwari, (Which is in the home of thousands of people originating from Puducode) who is my family Goddess. Some how I never wondered as to who painted these great pictures.
About   eight years  back   I came to know that these have been painted by Sri Sitaram, who was 77 at that time  and even then he   very busy in making oil paintings of various gods in Palakkad. Sri Sitaram belongs to Guruvayoor and was given initial training by his father Sri Srinivasa Iyer , who was a celebrated painter. He had the good fortune to Meet Sri Kondaiah Raju , a celebrated oil painter who was producing almost all the calendars in India originating from Sivakasi , some 40 years back.. Sri Sitaram got interested in oil painting and specialized in Portrait painting. He was especially interested in Painting Gods and that too Guruvayurappan. His painting skill is very great .
   He told me   that Several   days the Guruvayur temple authorities permitted him to   see   for some time Guruvayurappan , at the time of Nirmalya  Darsanam   when  the God only wore a Kaupeena and his painting of Guruvayurappan  is an extremely rare thing to get .In Puducode also   after the morning Pooja it seemd he used   to be shut inside the temple after morning pooja , so that  he can see the goddess   extremely well.

  When I met him accidentally  before eight years,  I had the God fortune to help him get  lot of contacts and orders to draw God’s pictures.  I am  attaching his paintings of Guruvayurappan and Puducode Bhagawathy. After  That  I lost all contact with him,

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