April 29 marks 165th Birthday of one of the greatest Indian artists, Raja Ravi Varma. His paintings have influenced artists of future generations and he was the first one to feature the Indian Gods and mythological characters in earthly surroundings in his paintings. According to his Horoscope, he was born on 29th April in 1848 in Travancore in Kerala in 1848 to an accomplished scholar, Ezhumavail Neelakanthan Bhattatiripad and mother Umayamba Thampuratti, who was also a poet and writer. With the support of HH Maharaja Ayilyam Thirunal of Travancore, he started formal training in painting. He learnt water painting by Rama Swami Naidu and oil painting by Dutch portraitist Thoedor Jenson. Ravi Varma had a successful art career and for which, he was recognized. In 1873, he received an award for an exhibition of his paintings at Vienna.
In 1893, some of his paintings were also sent to the World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago. travelled to different places in India in search of subjects. He mostly modeled Hindu Goddesses on South Indian women, considering them beautiful. His paintings illustrating the story of Dushyanta, Shakuntala, Nala and Damayanti from the Mahabharata are highly notable. The mythological characters in his paintings are a part of the Indian imagination of the epics. The work of Raja Ravi Varma was often criticized for being sentimental and showy in his style.
This Celebrity received several honours in his lifetime. In 1904, he was given the Kaisar-i-Hind Gold Medal by the Viceroy Lord Curzon, on behalf of the King Emperor. It was this time when he was first mentioned as Raja Ravi Varma and since then, he was always called as Raja Ravi Varma. His paintings with beautiful and graceful sari-clad women were the most remembered during his lifetime. He was married to Pururuttathi Nal Bhageerathi Amma Thampuran and had two sons and three daughters.
He was born under the zodiac sign Taurus. He was a strong, reserved and quiet person. Not only him, but his ideas were also sensible and practical, which was clearly visible in his art works. On October 2, 1906, Ravi Varma died of diabetes in his Kilimanoor Palace home. In 1993, artist A. Ramachandran and Rupika Chawla together curated an exhibition of the works of Raja Ravi Varma at the National Museum, New Delhi. For his contribution to the Indian art, the Government of Kerala has instituted an award named, Raja Ravi Varma Puraskaram. It is given to those who excel in the art and culture field. Some of the well known personalities who received this prestigious award are K.G. Subramaniam, M.V. Devan, A. Ramachandran, and V.S. Valiathan and others. Recently, I shared Zohra Sehgal's horoscope.
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