CHENNAI: Over several centuries, the image and significance of the bard with a beard — Thiruvalluvar and his magnum opus Thirukkural — have remained relevant and found a certain resonance within and beyond the borders of the state and the country. From the doyen of south Indian cinema, the late K Balachander translating the image of Valluvar and the words of the first kural (couplet) ‘Agara Mudala’ as his production house — Kavithalayaa Productions’ image; former President of India late APJ Abdul Kalam often quoting verses from the book during speeches; establishment of a Valluvar Kottam (similar to the one in Chennai) in Myanmar by the Tamil diaspora; youngsters across the globe donning quirky T-shirts with the philosopher’s image to more recently, the portrait of the poet wearing saffron robes and rudraksha beads (tweeted by Tamil Nadu’s BJP unit) becoming an episode of heated debate about the poet’s religious and caste identities — the ‘Universal poet’ has not only been a mascot of Tamil pride but also a constant muse, especially for leaders, scholars, translators and artists.
In Chennai, digital art curator Dhanasekarapandian M, who adopted the poet’s aphoristic teachings on wealth, love and virtue as his subject of interest in 2013, has been beaming Thiruvalluvar back to the future in the cyberscape by splicing the sage’s verses with screenshots and soundtracks, along with different collaborators since 2017. “This is a journey of my trials at transcending the Thirukkural,” he says. His Instagram page, in its essence, is a digital anthology of rhetorics.
Like fireflies glowing in the night, the images that dot the grids of his page have a certain luminosity. They are in many ways visual allegories. “Based on our emotions, a certain mindset or a specific context, any set of words could end up as rhetorical statements. Looking at Thirukkural from this perspective helped me express and reinterpret the verses in different mediums. This anthology is a compilation of verse excerpts from the ancient literary work but re-explored under a contemporary rhetorical context,” he explains, adding that the luminosity of the images is symbolic to enlightenment.Dhana’s idea for such a “fast fiction” and “techno tribute” to Thiruvalluvar stemmed from the formative exposure he had to the works of the poet.
“When I was a child, my grandfather used to send me different versions of the Thirukkural during summer vacations. Though I didn’t understand its importance back then, eventually I started spending time reading the verses. Every time I did, I had a certain visual imagery about the couplet in my head,” he shares. In 2012, when Dhana went on to learn the Japanese language, he was introduced to the world of Haikus. “The Japanese grammar was very similar to Tamil. In the process of learning, I started looking at local poetry and tongue twisters to get a hang of the language and Haikus helped me a lot. That’s when I realised that the Haikus were an equivalent of the Thirukkural — brief and compact. But despite Thirukkural being recognised by people across the world, the global reception that Haikus has is certainly more. This made me revisit the literary work,” he says.
Soon, the artist brewed the idea to take the teaching of Thirukkural via quirky art and merchandise. “In all the kurals, Valluvar brings in an uvamai (a simile or an analogy). The images and the comparisons he created of different verses and its excerpts made me weave mental images relevant to the modern era. So, I thought it would be a good idea to give it a shape. I wanted to rope in artists to create these images for me so I started looking for reference images to share with them. That’s how this initiative was born,” shares Dhana. In his anthology, excerpts of the kurals are interspersed with imagery and music to create a mood and convey Valluvar’s (and sometimes Dhana’s) narratives.
“The images are screenshots of artworks by various artists. Credits are duly given to everyone,” asserts Dhana, who has collaborated with several artists and studios including The Render Studio, Kime.shadow, Udaya Kumar, Naveen Gowtham, Sridhar, Tharun Sekar, eves_art_project, and Fesq. “The images are edited to suit the palette of the project. It’s minimal yet evocative. I’ve also used soundtracks by artistes including Remo Fernandez, Billie Elish, Amit Trivedi , Hanz Zimmer, Ronu Majumdar, and The Beatles,” he says. His seven-year journey, he says, has been laced with learnings, and going forward, Dhana hopes to integrate and serve his followers with an Augmented Reality experience to make the mood of the kurals more immersive. “The idea is to use a medium that will convey the different emotions, moods and the easter eggs in these couplets with people across the globe, without any barriers — language or cultural,” he says.
Future plans
Dhana’s journey has been laced with learnings, and going forward, Dhana hopes to integrate an Augmented Reality experience to make the mood of the kurals more immersive.
For details, visit Instagram handle @footprints_dm