Discovered an Artist - awarded " Lifetime Achievement Award 2015 "

This week we had a chance of meeting Mr.Shanmugham , 67 years old artisan with immence knowledge. He was given " Lifetime Achievement Award " by Tamilnadu Handicraft Development Corporation for his contribution to art. He makes papier machie idols such as Krishnan , Ganesha and ship to various part of India.

Shanmugham started to explain his work by praising and thanking his Guru for making his life more purposeful.

Life of Shanmugham :
Shanmugham was born to a family who make traditional lamps and pots using clay in Keerapalayam near Chidambaram. Shanmugham learned art using clay from his childhood and as age passed his father wants his son to have better and purpose life so he was sent to Chennai to work as apprentice for artist Kumaragurudasa Pillai. He was accepted by his guru after taking oath that he will not eat meat and alcohol in his life.  Coming from region where his childhood was filled with meat especially Eral (Prawn) which was unique with size between 1 ft to 2 ft but Shanmugham agreed with hesitation and took oath also signed paper that he will never takes meat which he follows till now. He was staying with his Guru for nearly 12 yrs learning about making sculptures and also ancient literature. Returning back to Chidambaram after several years working with clay was difficult for him as business process so through a training session he was able to learn make perfect idols using paper-mache over a time period.

    " Paper-mache has long history which originated in China during 10th century and traveled to Persia through prisoners and became economically successful in Europe in latter centuries."

He shifted his base to Coimbatore at age of 22 as he was informed about business opportunity in this region. He was running his work near Sivalaya theater and later in Sundarapuram. Shanmugham was also having hurdles to sell a unique product as market was dominated by plaster of paris and clay. But he educated his customer about benefit of paper mache and established himself his business successfully in Coimbatore with his own premises . So now customers from Kerala and other states visit his place to purchase specifically Paper-Mache based Idol.

Unique Selling Proposition of Shanmugham work:
Shanmugham feels godly when he draws eyes of idols as it is like giving life to idol which he learnt specifically from his guru.

Work : Shanmugham makes  Showpieces , Pooja idols and specially Bommai Kolu using paper

Courtesy Pictures : Picture of Mr. Shanmugham was taken from The Hindu article Apr'10 2013 .