The magic of calligraphy by a master

“Letters act as practical and useful signs, but also as pure and inner melody”

- Wassily Kandinsky

He is a master of calligraphy, the art of creating decorative handwriting or lettering. And it is that mastery in this creative segment that made artist Narayana Bhattathiri quite unique. As we all know, calligraphy is not just an art, and some basic knowledge of calligraphy would definitely improve the confidence of the children to write better, thus strengthening their academic performance as well.
When the Velammal Knowledge Park (VKP) decided to hold a workshop on calligraphy, the first person who came to our mind was Bhattathiri, who has an unparalleled talent in this field. We wanted our students to have firsthand experience on calligraphy, while organizing this workshop from November 5 to 7 in the Ponneri campus of the educational group.

Aptly named ‘Calli-Darpan - Let your letters give wing to your creative spirit’, this workshop proved to be a unique experience for the students from Class 1 to 9, which helped them explore the possibilities of the medium and various styles in calligraphy, thus benefiting their creative thinking and learning. 
Since calligraphy is the art of beautifying the handwriting, we have to begin from the very beginning, said Bhattathiri, before he set the ball rolling. During the session, he was so humble to share his own calligraphy pens for the students to use and experience it thus winning their heart. In the three-day session, the students learned the basics of calligraphy, by practicing straight, vertical and horizontal lines as well as curved lines, followed by squares and then English alphabets. The veteran calligraphist introduced two different writing tools - automatic pen and brush pen - to the students.

Since he provided them hands-on experience throughout the three-day workshop, the students were totally engaged in the process and they loved it very much, as it was a new technique for them.
During the interaction, Bhattathiri also displayed the calligraphies he did in different languages including English, Tamil and Malayalam, and elaborated the magic behind it, thus helping them get an idea about the technique and art of calligraphy.

Bhattathiri is a well-known calligrapher, illustrator and artist, and he has been doing illustrations and calligraphy for a wide spectrum of books, magazines and journals in many language publications for the last four decades. He has won several national and international accolades, including the South Korean Jikji prize.

His creative pursuits once again underline the adage, “More powerful than all poetry, more pervasive than all science, more profound than all philosophy are the letters of the alphabet, twenty-six pillars of strength upon which our culture rests.” His ability to take the students directly to the magic world of calligraphy was appreciated by all.

What was even more interesting was that on the evening of the last day of the workshop, there was a live demonstration by the calligraphy master at the Indoor auditorium of the VKP campus in Ponneri, where he wrote the vision statement of Velammal Knowledge Park, on a ten-metre long paper roll, using various types of brushes and rollers. As he wrote the statement, “To provide a unique schooling program, while equipping children to enjoy their early learning years with values, skills & knowledge in their chosen stream for leading a successful life”, in his beautiful calligraphic style, the students who witnessed the formation of the artistic letters applauded in excitement.
Through such creative and interactive sessions, VKP aims to use art as a tool to teach and learn any subject more artistically and scientifically.