Edmund Thomas Clint was born on May 19, 1976 in Cochin, a beautiful port city in the Indian state of Kerala. He was the only son in the family, and his father, Muraparanbier Thomas Joseph, named his son after his favorite Hollywood movie star, Clint Eastwood.
Amazing talent
Before he was one year old, Clint, who could not walk but climbed on his belly, drew a perfect circle with chalk around his stomach on the living room floor. Although his parents did not realize that Crete had a talent for art, they gave him great support for his passion for painting, buying him some colorful chalk and letting him paint on the ground.
Joseph, an accountant with a modest income and spoiled son, often took out business trips, scouring small shops in Mumbai, Delhi and other places for children's books and second-hand world masterpieces, as well as large bags of crayons in more than 75 colors.
When Clint was able to stand up, he found the new "canvas" on the wall, and soon the walls were covered with graffiti at the height he could reach. The 5,000 crayons Joseph bought, clint ran out in three months.
Clint was born with a keen and meticulous sense of observation, and under the careful tutelage of his mother, Chinnama, he learned to observe and revere nature.
At first, Clint's work was all simple line drawings. His animal sketches are both godlike, revealing maturity and perfection that do not correspond to age.
There's something to say
Artist G. Mohanan was the first to discover Clint's extraordinary talent. Mohanan was a close friend of Joseph's and often came to his house to paint. Unlike toddlers, most of whom had limited concentration, Clint, who would sit quietly and watch intently when Mohanan drew.
Joseph wants to ask Mohanan to be Klint's teacher, but Mohanan refuses, feeling that art has melted in Clint's blood and that he has nothing to teach.
Mohanan suggested to Joseph, "Let him [Clint] paint what he wants to paint, and he has something to say." ”
Whether Mohanan agreed or not, in Clint's mind, Mohanan was his master.
With the encouragement of his parents and the guidance of Mohanan, from chalk to crayons to watercolors, Clint tried to depict the world he saw and heard in a variety of mediums.
Joseph was a master storyteller who told his son stories from all over the world, Christian stories, Hindu mythology, Aesop's fables, beluga whales, Robinson Crusoe, Tolstoy's children's fables...
Samson who killed a lion with his bare hands, King David who knocked down the giant Goliath with a slingshot, Hanuman the mighty monkey, Arjuna the great archer, and the heroic prince Kinor (Arjuna's son), they were all heroes worshipped by Clint.
Clint's favorite stories from the Hindu epics Mahabharata and The Ramayana, many of which revolve around the characters and plots of the epics.
The character Robona in Ramayana
The painting skills he exhibited at a young age require years of training and experience for others to master.
Clint's work involves all aspects of life, and his world is a kaleidoscope. He had so many ideas to express, so he kept painting, sometimes completing hundreds of works a day.
Temples with saints in the distance
The girl who picks flowers
Fight the disease
At the age of three, Clint was diagnosed with kidney failure, his stomach bulging, his limbs swollen, and he felt exhausted most of the time. Illness did not hinder his enthusiasm for creation, and when his mother massaged his cramped right hand, he used his left hand to draw. At a young age, his work has begun to deal with profound themes of death, loneliness and love.
Many doctors said that Clint's illness was hopeless. Unwilling to give up, Joseph eventually found the famous homeopathic doctor, Dr. Abraham, who finally pulled his son back from the brink of death.
The two years after the illness was brought under control were a period of explosion of Clint's creative power, and he played freely, and the best works appeared at this time.
Local traditional activities are one of his favorite subjects.
The Trisulpuram Festival, Kerala's most famous festival, is held every Year in April or May, where a herd of elephants wearing gold headdresses parades and countless tourists come to watch.
Live photos of the Ploem Festival in Trisul.
Clint's Trisulpuram Festival, with its unique colors and compositions, perfectly recreates the festival scene and is one of his masterpieces.
Trisur Prom Festival
Clint is always able to express what he sees and hears from a unique perspective, noticing what others overlook.
Hinduism reveres snakes, and another festival in Kerala, the Snake Boat Race (similar to the Chinese Dragon Boat Race), is usually watched by boats and races. Clint depicts a snake boat race, and the most striking thing in the picture is the huge orange sunset.
Snake boat race
destiny
At the age of 5, Clint won first place in a competition for painters under the age of 18.
Clint competes in painting competitions
After the painting competition, on the way home with his father, he witnessed Teyam performing for the first time.
"Theyyam" is a dance-based religious ritual in which performers dress in red traditional costumes and red masks and dance after the gods are "possessed."
Photos of the Triam ceremony
Two months later, Clint completed another masterpiece, Teyam.
Something happened years later that made Clint's parents think that the painting foreshadowed their son's inevitable fate.
It was at a Clint exhibition where Joseph and Chinnama saw a group of Teyam performers and makeup artists among the visitors. Eager to learn about the gods in their son's paintings, they asked the group, and one makeup artist said, "When we put on Teyam makeup, we deliberately don't finish it." We fear that if it's all done (makeup work), the artist (makeup artist) will soon die. This "Teyam" is absolutely complete and perfect. ”
Teyama
Clint has received more and more awards and honors, but he doesn't care about them. His heart longed for answers to deeper questions, "Where do we come from?" Where to go after death? Why do we die? ”
His kidney disease recurred after two years of incubation, and on April 15, 1983, a month before his seventh birthday, Crete passed away. Before falling into a coma, he whispered to his mother, "It's all right, Mom... I might fall asleep suddenly. When you call me, I probably won't wake up... I was just sleeping. Please don't be upset, Mom... Please don't cry. ”
Clint never woke up from his slumber again.
He left behind more than 25,000 works. To pay tribute to this young master, the Kerala Tourism Board organizes a painting competition every year, inviting up-and-coming artists from all over the world to participate.
postscript
Abraham Lincoln said, "It doesn't matter how many years a person lives, what matters is how he spends those years." ”
In other words, the quality of life is more important than the length of life. This is confirmed by Clint's short life, as he triumphed over death with art and left an indelible page in the world.
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