Beyond the biennale: How graffiti is rewriting the streets of Kochi

Visit Fort Kochi and Mattancherry to see the art, history and politics on its walls.

“This is the unique nature of public art – its instability combined with the intervention of public interaction with a painting. It gives the painting another, different life,” says artist and Trespassers member Jinil Manikandan. His response to a question about the transience of graffiti in public places – their sensitivity to heat, dust and rain. And of course the scope of destruction that makes one wonder if the effort is worth it.

He illustrates his point with a previous work, a mural painted collectively at the Copra Market in Kozhikode in 2021, where he depicted the processes that brought coconuts to market. “When we revisited the site after some time, we saw that there were coconuts placed in front of the wall we had painted, which we thought gave it a ‘alive/living’ kind of feel,” he says.

Coming to the present, Jinil references the graffiti on a wall in the premises of Cube Art Space in Mattancherry, a venue for Adam, where one of the collateral events of the Kochi Muziris Biennale is going on.

The work in question is by a group of eight Kerala-based artists – Jinil, Vishnupriyan, Srirag P, Ambadi Kannan, Arjun Gopi, Pranav Pranav Prabhakaran, Bashar UK and Jatin Latha Shaji. All Fine Arts students of Sri Shankaracharya Sanskrit University, Kalady – The wall is 20×35 feet tall and is bright with details. In vivid shades of pink, green, blue and yellow, it is basically a picture of life in the area with a glimpse of the surreal. Find a cable of an air conditioner, which turns out to be a rope with a person walking on the rope, which turns into the tail of a sleeping tiger.

His second work is on a water-facing wall by Arman Collective inspired by the surrounding scenes – anchored fishing boats, the people who live and work in the area with a generous dose of imagination.

Jinil says, “We never go to a site with a ready-made story or plan. The ‘story’ comes from the knowledge and people of the area. As we start, the picture grows.”

While, as part of KMB’s The Island Mural Project, muralists/groups from across the country such as Aravani Art Project, Ocean Shiva, Munir Kabani and The Trespassers have painted walls in and around Fort Kochi and Mattancherry, works of other artists are also adding to the ‘walls-as-gallery’ experience of these places. The Biennale’s stated intention with this project is to invite “everyone to experience the neighborhood in a new light”.

Historically underground, graffiti is now a major form of public art. Often used as a tool of political and social expression, street art or public art is usually political. “Art is political, it has to be. Even when artists claim to be non-political, they are stating their politics,” says Jinil.

In 2012, anonymous artist Geswho, known as the ‘Indian Banksy’, began painting on the walls of Fort Kochi. Over the years, he has portrayed Michael Jackson dancing Kathakali, painting the Mona Lisa chatta-munduChe Guevara dressed like a porter, and Pablo Picasso, Salvador Dali and Vincent Van Gogh painted houses in loincloths.

gallery out of the box

Neelu Sengupta, head of storytelling at Fearless Collective, says murals make art democratized and accessible: “It takes art out of the traditional white cube space of the art gallery.” This group of women encourages participation in creating public art with women or other underrepresented communities around the world. The Fearless Collective, started by artist Shilo Shiv Suleman in 2012, encourages dialogue.

Although it coincides with the Biennale, this work is not part of it. The painting on the 200 meter wall of the Coast Guard office in Fort Kochi was done with the cooperation of the local community. These works show large-scale portraits of the community – fishermen, and those at the forefront of mangrove conservation.

“Community stories are important, whether they relate to the climate crisis, gender identity, peacebuilding or social change,” says Neelu. The location is also deliberate, as the Indian Coast Guard is involved in marine conservation. The 16 Fearless Collective artists, women and non-binary individuals working on it are not only from India but also from Bangladesh, Nepal and Sri Lanka, including members of the Ambassador Programme.

Mural of Oshin Shiva on the wall of Palm Fiber Pvt. Ltd. Ltd. near Aspinwall House on Calvethy Road worked together with two local artists Aslah KP and Muhammad Ali Johar. She says the work “engages with Dalit visibility and brings to the fore the caste-oppressed cultural forms and histories of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.”

Munir Kabani’s ‘A Wall of Love’, near Artsila, the venue of the Students’ Biennale, with its yellow and green horizontal stripes giving the illusory impression of an enclosed space, has ‘Love’ and ‘Sneham’ (Malayalam for love) written on it in English. It explores the tension between language and perception – how words and images can represent ideas and also shape the way we see. It is a popular spot for taking photographs with locals and tourists. Superficially simplistic – it makes us question whether what we see is real.

Aravani Art Project, an art group led by trans-women and cis-women, aiming to create space for people from the transgender community, has created murals at two locations, Women and Children’s Hospital Mattancherry and VKL Warehouse, depicting women at different stages of life going about the business of making a living.

Near Paper House, ‘Walk Past You’ designed by US-based artist Reshidev RK compels you to stop. While the digital art is by Reshidev, the painting is by Renjith Joseph and Arjun Ananth, part of Kochi-based artist Alvin Charlie’s crew Charlie and the Boys. “We wanted the history of Fort Kochi to be told clearly in the form of a mural, which is how this work came about,” says Sandeep Johnson, who curated the piece. Intricately detailed in Reshidev’s signature style, it features glimpses of Fort Kochi’s history – pillars inspired by Vasco da Gama, a local woman sifting pepper, a Jewish woman in typical clothing of that period, and St. Francis Basilica.

It doesn’t have to be all serious, take a look at ‘Amphibian Aesthetics’, a group show at Ishara House (Kashi Halegua House) on Burger Street in Fort Kochi. The painting, a recreation of Bengaluru-based graphic novelist Appupen’s work, is on display at Ishara House. It is part of a multiplatform narrative connecting with audiences through prints and graffiti, marked by the artists’ signature dark humor and pop aesthetics. According to Ishara Arts, “It examines identity politics, surveillance, ecological unease and the constructed logics of propaganda.”

Another ‘invitation’ is painted on the wall outside Lakshmi Madhavan’s spectacular installation, ‘Looming Bodies’, an exhibition of traditional handlooms from Kerala, which tells about the handloom weavers of Balaramapuram. The fresco shows the hands of a weaver weaving a golden kasavu.

And then there are some that are memorials like Kappalandimukku, outside the Uru Art Harbour, a reconstruction of Monk, a painting by the late artist Midhun Mohan, who died in 2023. Midhun’s works spoke about social and cultural issues prevalent in contemporary society, while some were examinations of the past, exploring stories embedded in history.

“If I had to pinpoint when this kind of public art started gaining attention, I would put it at the first Biennale of 2012 when Geshu’s works started appearing on the walls of Fort Kochi. It was more underground then… Today the tradition continues, and whatever form it takes, it is still political artistic expression,” says Sasi Kumar Vallikkadan of the Uru Artists Collective.

Even though the Kochi Muziris Biennale ends on March 31, graffiti will remain a little longer – part of our everyday lives, long after the venues and warehouses are empty.