Venkanna's swastik art gallery

The best part about travelling is enjoying all the newness! Taking in the new air, stepping on to the new land and meeting up some new generous humans.

Here's to the Venkanna Jalimane, a 62-year-old man full of childlike enthusiasm, generosity and creativity. Lives in a tiny village called Hittlalli in Uttar Karnataka which falls between yellapur and Sirsi. Bellow is the beautiful and short description of his gallery and his largeheartedness 😊

He owns up the Swastik art gallery which is in the attic of his age-old beautiful traditional house. The gallery is filled with simple yet amazingly creative artworks of Venkanna. Various sculptures made out of tree's trunks and roots, paintings of artists, poets, philosophers, leaders, animals and birds on the dry peepal leaves. Various beautiful greeting cards made out of direct organic materials like leaves and flowers. He has written entire Bhagavad Geeta on almost 1000 dry peepal leaves which spread till more than 1 km. And him being one of the huge fans of Modi Ji, he has made more than 2000 collages and photo-montages of him. All the walls of his house are decorated and painted beautifully by Venkanna. He makes key chains out waste wooden pegs, stones and seeds. He says nothing goes for waste in his vicinity.

He is just not an artist, but also a passionate collector of all the antiques and a vivid nature lover and a farmer. One can get to learn so many things from him. He has planted several bonsai trees and grows all the crops by himself that they need every day. He has a special room completely dedicated to the antique collections which have things like one of the first cameras ever invented, gramophone, old musical instruments, some of the oldest crockeries, stones and rack full of glass bottles of different sizes, colours and shapes and pendulum clocks etc. He has collected all of them from his old rich friends by gifting them his own artworks and not buying them with money because he never had them. Even now he says its really hard to maintain all of this because he is all alone who just stays with his 80-year-old mother and earns his living through farming.

I just can't thank God enough for all the forces that drove me to this place. When we arrived there, Venkanna welcomed us as if his grandchildren are home. We left from Belgaum at 6 in the morning and reached there around 12 in the noon, no breakfast no tea, when his mom heard this, in just 30 mins she called us down to have breakfast while Venkanna was busy explaining his work, they pulled us down to the dining table and she served us with hot yummy dosas with homemade ghee and chutney and only then she let us go n have a look around their place.

As Venkanna took us around his home/ art gallery, he told us so many heart touching stories of his life and how he fought and overcame through art and his blessing of creativity which helped him fight loneliness. As he lost his wife because of cancer. 

And just in two hours, his mom had kept the lunch ready for us, though we were so full because of dosas she didn't let us go without having lunch. Before we left she applied us kunkum and gave 10Rs as it was their age-old culture. She told that I reminded her of her granddaughter i.e venkanna's

daughter who was in a coma due to brain amperage. She said that I looked like her and showed me her pictures, told that she was a classical singer and I too did sing a song for her and all of us were so emotional in the end while leaving😢. Venkanna gifted me his book that he had written based on his art and craft, also he gave us some dry peepal leaves. 😊

On my way back on the bus, I was filled with so much gratitude and lots of happiness. Never before I have been so happy and satisfied. Realized that still generous amount of humanity exists on this beautiful earth. Went there with a hunger to seek some art and knowledge and there we were poured with so much love and blessings. And the food that Venkanna's mom served us with so much love and caress!no amount of world's 5-star food can beat that.

This was the most precious jewel in my treasure box of memories!

Pic credits: Arpit Kamat.

With regards, 

Kanchan Kulhalli.