November - 2014
On a cold winter afternoon during the winter break in
Dallas, I was browsing the YOUTUBE to just pass time. One of the suggested
videos had an old man in a dancing pose in the rain. Yes, this video is from
the age old Telugu classic “SHANKARAABHARANAM”. At that particular moment I
felt compelled to click on the video. The music, lyric and the action aroused a
feeling that was close to ecstasy in my heart. This made me watch the video
again. The thirst for that feeling rose furthermore and I was induced into
watching the full movie. Although this was one of the best Telugu movies ever
made, I did not have had the good fortune of watching this master piece till
then. Although my thirst for the ecstatic feeling was not satiated, the film
was a revelation. It revealed the passion of a director, an able, creative and
sensible human being trying to convey his love for music and his view on the
then societal structure in India. He was subtle in conveying a message and
sublime in praising an art. He was an ardent fan of classical music and a
faithful follower of various Indian dance forms. He was Dr. K Vishwanath,
honorably known as “KALATAPASWI”, a sage who meditated on art.
March -2016
He was a great visionary and an even better story teller.
Each of his films, I may be exaggerating here a bit but many of his films were
so gripping that few people like me do not want to move forward. This blog post
was started in 2014 November. Apart from noting my laziness, any one reading
this can see that today, it is 2016, and I have resumed writing this blog just
after watching another epic of his “SAAGARA SANGAMAM”. This is the third time I
am seeing the movie in the last year and a half. I value time. I always feel
bad when I waste time but watching these movies does not look like wasting
time. I do not know if this is rational but when I cry along with Kamal Hassan,
who was weeping, after dancing for his mother for the last time, I feel that ecstasy
again. I may be an emotional person, but I know that the movie is a story and
it did not happen. I know that Kamal was just acting and he was not actually
crying, but I cry. I involuntarily feel the pain and then I reach that state
where I feel like I am close to the something that can be conceived only when
we are not just conscious but super conscious. That feeling does not last long
and then slowly my thoughts confluence into thinking about the person who had
the conviction, confidence and most important of all, the content in him to
create these master pieces.
This capability of his does not look like an inborn talent. He
was not a gifted lyricist like his own Sirivennela Seeta Rama Sastry, or an extremely
talented singer like his close associate SP Balasubramanyam. This man not only
had love for Indian art forms but also had a penchant for societal reforms. He
was a master in interweaving the ancient Indian art with the modern reformist
ideas. He was an ancient modernist. He wanted the change in bad retaining the
good. All these words do not do justice to his work. I, with my limited
vocabulary and expression am not competent enough to complement the
completeness of Mr. Vishwanath. So after darting out 586 words, I came to a
conclusion that I am not able to transform my thoughts into words. Here, in
this situation I will have to tell about his greatness. There is always a
transmission loss in any kind of transfer be it tangible goods or intangible ideas.
But his efforts were such that even after transferring his feelings to his
lyricists, singers, actors and editors where there was a possibility of
information deformity at a minimum of four centers, he was able to bring out so
many subtle emotions on screen. Every single time after watching his movies
like SWARNA KAMALAM, SWATI KIRANAM ET all, I somehow cannot believe that those
movies were not made by single person. I cannot digest the idea that some
hundred people or so were involved on doling out an epic which had a single
theme. This again brings me to the influence of that man on the entire crew of
those movies. If he was not passionate he could never have done such movies. Hence
I called him a passionate person. Then I took the freedom of using the Sanskrit
word R
ishi, which was used to refer Mantra- Drashtas or the seers of mantra.
The Vedic seers. Mr. K. Vishwanath was no doubt not a mantra drsahta, but he
was a bhava drashta and a kala drashta and hence he can definitely be referred
to as a Rishi. Thus came the title “He Was a Passionate Rishi.”
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