Text: Varun Kannan Photos: Anand Krishna & Kerala Folklore Theatre
The Kerala Folklore Theatre owned by George J Thallath takes you to a place somewhere in the vast expanse of time.
What is it about the past that beacons us? But on certain days, returning from our conquests; deadlines crossed, targets met, basking in the glory of a mirage that we call success, isn’t there a sense of loss? Fleeting moments of a nameless sorrow that is sometimes too passing to even acknowledge; a loss that is almost intangible to make a fuss about. But sometimes you chance into a place or an experience that makes the enormity of the loss painfully apparent. The Kerala Folklore Theater and Museum at Thevara, Kochi, I discovered, was one such experience.
A Good Old World
A testimony to George J Thallath’s undying love for art and culture, the museum was painstakingly built over a period of eight years. Housing artifacts, sculptures and excavations that the man collected over a period of thirty years, the place is ethereal, in the most intense sense of the word. Built on three floors, the museum dedicates a floor each to the Malabar, Kochi and Thiruvithankur style and is also interspersed with artifacts from other kingdoms of the South. They look at the artifacts as a tangible part of the culture and see themselves as temporary custodians of it. George, during our conversation, clarifies that it was no passion. No, he makes that very clear. It was as if he had come to ridicule the ‘passion’ word that
has been used and abused over time. It was not a rich man’s many obsessive hobbies either. Thirty years of pursuit, collecting these artifacts, treasuring them and building them an abode, what then would you call this undying spirit? Not too long ago a writer far away from this shore told a story of an old fisherman, who refuses to give up on his life’s purpose. In the tale, Mr. Hemingway failed to coin a word to connote ‘that’ which drove the old man forward. Saffron clad or sometimes naked men that emerged from snowy mountains of this country at a time when time did not exist (at least in its modern sense) didn’t, Dharma they called it. That which you are born to do, that which is your inherent nature; maybe that’s what drives George, His dharma. I am not sure.
The Wakeup Call
Spending time with these stone sculptures, I was forced to ponder about or even enter into the heads of these artists as they carved. In this land where everything was seen as a path to enlightenment, isn’t there a reason to believe that these ‘karma yogis’ carved their way to bliss. George explained to me the sanctity of the art forms, the penance of these men and women, the respect with which they treated their embellishments; the honor and respect that he thought was amiss in our largely commercialized world and I found myself nodding a silent yes. There is another story that George tells us, a story of confrontation with a man who was born to a different dharma, the dharma of being adorned in colors and playing characters of old stories, a Kathakali artist.
As cabarets and Mujhras got too mainstream, the quest for the exotic got the rich to employ our Kathakali man in one of their luxury cruises. An exchange of not too pleasant words with George and the Kathakali man pours out his misery. A silent vow was taken, and years later the Folklore theater was born. Honored were those men who lived for their art. As I sat in the theater with only the thirty-three gods engraved on the ceiling for the company, I closed my eyes to witness a Kathakali performance. A life-worn elderly man performing to the empty theater, no patrons and none to witness the act. He performs for long and then withdraws, accepting defeat. He steps down but none in the long rows of empty
chairs rose to acknowledge, no rasikas, none. This exactly was George’s fears. Empty halls, a generation of Malayalis who are away from being Malayalis. Does it scare you or scar you? As I walked out of the place, I was reminded of a TV show that I once caught about the Amazonian tribes and their fight to keep their indigeneity. The art of timing I wondered. I forced myself to believe that it was a random thought.