Christmas in Thrissur

Angelo da Fonseca, Goan artist

Our first Christmas in India! Our second ever Christmas away from UK.

But after two years of lockdown Xmas dinners, just the two of us staring at each other over the dining room table with a take away from Saski’s … it felt right to be doing something completely different! 

The week before Fort Kochi began to sparkle! By the time we reached Thrissur the while town was twinkling. The traffic Through Thrissur was crazy…Christmas Eve rush and mad processions of Father Christmasses with drums…it could only happen in India…followed by fire crackers at midnight …it’s so wonderful how they appropriate every festival in their own inimitable way! Buon Natale in Thrissur

We are staying in Kavitha’s apartment a few k from their family house…and on Christmas morning K came with an amazing breakfast of flaked rice and onion, Rajesh and Adi arrived soon after. Always a great conversation around the table.

 For lunch we went to a local hotel for a special Christmas buffet! The   Indian version of plum pudding…or was it plum cake…the brandy sauce was the best! Everyone was dressed in red and white, including Kavitha! 

After a quick Xmas nap we set off for the beach… quite a long drive but beautiful when we got there…the sunlight was low, crossing over a little river…we went on through the palm trees to a beach with big stones. I sat on the rocks watching the sun go down with people silhouetted against the waves.

We stopped on the way back for a snack although I wasn’t hungry in the least and I had fried prawns and parotta …delicious 

Then as we headed into the centre of Thrissur, the Round * was total gridlock…but it gave us the chance to see the lights…goodness knows how Rajesh managed to manoeuvre through it all! 

To biennale …or not to B

We were up and standing first in line at the gates at 10am on 12.12.23 for the opening of the 5th Kochi-Muziris biennale. We have been to every one over the last 10 years!

Then a boy came up and said the opening was postponed until December 23…we couldn’t believe it…well actually we could…the day we are leaving for Thrissur! But we will be back!

There were so many disappointed visitors from all over the world, press from Delhi. 

The cyclone was blamed…a strike by electricians was blamed, derelict building was blamed…new management and curatorial teams were blamed but basically they were never going to have been ready by the 12th and the heirachy is flawed.

We talked to so many disillusioned and frustrated artists…who had arrived to find no materials, no technical support, and broken promises every single day and night.

Open Letter from the Artists of the Kochi-Muziris Biennale 2022–23

The positive side of the postponement is that we have really enjoyed looking at the student biennale, and talking to the students about  their work. All the student and invitation exhibitions opened on time as they are run by professional gallery curators and owners. We have seen excellent and exciting work at every venue! 

Highlights included The Shadow Circus, a Personal Archive of Tibetan Resistance from 1957 - 1974, Tangled Heirarchy 2, William Kentridge, and the student's biennale.

Despite the temporary pavilion at Cabral yard being at least a month behind schedule we had the privilege of hearing William Kentridge recite Schwitter’s ‘ Ursonate ‘on a dilapidated stage at the Cochin Club, and two days later a South Korean percussionist, Seo Jungmin, playing on a 25 string instrument called a Gayageum, it sounded almost like a harp.

Village visits

When we first arrived in Kerala we were happy to be invited to visit Anju’s parents out in the sticks. Anju is our poet friend Wilson’s niece but she lives in Preston, near us. The same journey by rickshaw and metro, but this time to the end of the line where Joshna and her uncle and auntie came to pick us up. They live in a village tucked away near the airport. 

Anju’s mum Mary, Wilson’s sister greeted us with a delicious Keralan breakfast of appam and coconut stew. Joshna acted as interpreter! 

Then we went for a walk round the village, stopping at each house to meet friends and neighbours. It was hot and humid but so green and lush and so many different plants tapioca, banana plantations and pawpaw.

Lunch was mango curry, with a chutney made from little cucumbers that they grow on the roof, and Charlie has  beef and chicken.

Afterwards we sat round the table…Mary and her best friend, just us women and talked about our families, and showed photos on our phones …both Mary’s children live abroad, when I asked if she missed them, she said she was proud of what they have achieved…Joshna was translating all the time! 

Mary put a lovely sari on and came to see us off at the Metro station.

We felt so much love and warmth and it was a privilege to be able to spend time with Anju’s family. 

While we were staying with Kavitha in Thrissur we made several trips out into the countryside. The first was en route to visit the National Art Camp, when we dropped  Rajesh off at his ancestral home, where his two aunties live, one in her eighties with dementia … both such beautiful women…they have lived there all their lives, unmarried, the younger looking after the other. The younger sister cultivates a beautiful garden full of flowers.  

  

The countryside on our journey there was beautiful, lush, green, banana trees, palms, the house was down a long track that Rajesh’s father had to walk to school every day. 

Then we went down even smaller lanes to find the National Art camp…again a beautiful location…artists working outside and on the roof spaces. 

Back down more little lanes to pick Rajesh up…what we would have done without the satnav I don’t know.

At the National Art Camp we met Unni Krishna, who at 26 was the youngest artist to show in the Kochi Biennale in 2014 with his painted bricks. 

He invited us up into a hamlet in the hills north of Thrissur to his new

new studio, built on land he bought next to his father’s smallholding.

During lockdown he had painted a brick a day in his tiny bedroom … it’s an amazing visual diary of his thoughts and daily life.

Flotsam and Jetsam

After all the angst of the past few months…all the visa chaos…always wondering if we would actually make… it was exciting to arrive at Kochi airport…which was hot, humid and overcast.

Our taxi driver friend Das was there to meet us and gave us such a warm welcome! So lovely to see him and we chatted all the way to Aaron’s homestay…he knew exactly where it was!

It’s the perfect place for us. Comfy bed…a lovely roof terrace, a big kitchen and A/C! 

Down the alley way on the main road is Baby’s shop owned by our tea stall friend Thomas. The tea stall was all closed up but within a few days a friend of his was back in business, so Charlie is straight down there  every morning for his breakfast! 

Anyway Lucky Stars didn’t disappoint and we had tomato fry and aloo gobi and jeera rice and paratha all for 256 rupees

Our first impressions of Fort Kochi after four years and the pandemic was that it looked a bit scruffy round the edges, some of our favourite haunts had gone, and the reading room where Charlie did an installation during the 2019 biennale had finally fallen down! 

The following morning we caught a Rickshaw to the ferry and crossed over to Ernakulam in the mist. Another quick rickshaw ride to a nearby station and our first ride on the new Metro! It runs overhead the sprawling city and in 20 minutes we arrived at Edapally where Charlie and Kavitha were mounting their latest collaboration at Kerala museum…The title being Flotsam and Jetsam! 

We were treated to an amazing tour of figures from Kerala history…kind of son e lumiere meets Madame Tussaud’s.

It was so lovely to meet Kavitha after 4 years and also her students, who they had also invited to take part in the exhibition. For most of them it was their first ever show and we were swept into their excitement.

A long day putting the show up and one of the students tried to help me mess  about  creating reels and stories for a new Jigsaw Artists Collective Instagram site.

Back two days later for the opening…it was such a joyful afternoon…the students were so enthusiastic. Our urban sketching friend Presanth turned up on his bike, and our poet friend Kuzhur Wilson arrived with the media. Speeches were made, and songs were sung.

We arrived back over the water late and got caught in torrential rain in the alley to our homestay…I’ve never seen anything like it…we got drenched! Apparently it was the tail end of a cyclone in Tamil Nadu.

Will we actually get there?

At last I’ve found how to get into the old blog! 

After several very stressful attempts to complete the visa applications correctly we finally made it into Manchester on my birthday to hand in our forms! Now we just have to wait for our passports to come back! 

Fingers crossed! We set off on December 7th flying from Manchester to Cochin via Dubai...............

Biennale and other interventions!

A last look around the biennale which has been as stimulating as ever. This year the first female curator Anita Dube has given a refreshing new slant, including more female artists and also younger Indian artists whose work we have come across before. 

The evening programme of films and talks at Cabral Yard has also been excellent,  alongside the children's workshops.
We were captivated by the shadow puppet show and the excitement of the kids from local school that took part.

Charlie has also exhibited back in the DYFI reading room, and at Loafers cafe, and has been up early every morning after his breakfast with Thomas pasting poems on street corners...let's hope the goats don't eat them off the walls!

Another gallery in Mattancherry has also taken work for a show in April and he's started a collaboration with two talented young artists in Kochi which he hopes can be shown in Portugal next year.

It's been an incredible five weeks...finishing off tonight with the Bom Bolo Bob Marley festival down by the beach!

Back to Kochi

A stop over at Cherai beach on Vypin island, staying overnight in a lovely guesthouse on the backwaters. Vypin is thin, so the beach runs all the way down, but the backwaters are only a few hundred yards on the other side...hence an island. Charlie spotted a jetty perfect for fishing from if we ever come back...it's the ideal place for a retreat with early morning yoga classes just down the road.

So a month after we first arrived in Kochi on the Vypin ferry here we were back on it again, but this time we had traveled an hour down the road in a rickshaw! 

Time to relax and revisit old haunts, like the laid back Tea Pot cafe and an Aladdin's cave to buy a few gifts! 

Trying to fit it all the food we love here...clams for me...fish fry ( tuna) on our favourite stall on Rose Street. 

Here we met Zakki, who has a brand new tuk tuk, with a psychedelic patchworked interior, flashing lights and any music you care to choose! A very kind lady called Stella from Sheffield sponsored this purchase ( £2400) and Zakki is running a co-operative of drivers to raise money to help people in need. 

So now we only have a few days left...enjoying being back at our usual guest house, despite the rock hard mattresses! Getting up early and watching the hazy sun rise from the terrace as the temperatures start to climb to mid 30's each day! Then all you can do is sit under a fan till dusk! 

Tomorrow we will make one more visit to the Biennale, and start to reflect on all the amazing art work we have seen this time!

.