The Hindu Business Line : Animating his world

At 72, when most people are retiring from life, Mahendra Kumar is still running full speed ahead. The latest achievement for this veteran cinematographer, editor, photographer and animation artist is a legendary, low-cost method of silhouette animation.

Mahendra Kumar bounds into the room a trifle animated. And quite understandably so. He has just stumbled upon a revolutionary, cost-effective method for silhouette animation. At 72, when most people fade into the wings, this veteran cinematographer, editor, cameraman, photographer and animation artist has combined his ingenuity and experience and technique of legendary silhouette animator Lotte Reiniger in his teaching of the simple, effective and low-technology method of animation. It will "make a big difference" in the field and give animation a fillip especially in eastern India, he says.

He started out on his mission in late 2001 at Kolkata's Max Mueller Bhavan, and has recently received a grant from India Foundation for the Arts, Bangalore, to conduct animation workshops as a public education project. This will teach participants the art and craft of animation filmmaking through the two processes fine-tuned by Kumar to carry forward Reineger's method of animation.

Unlike the traditional method of placing the paper-cuts flat on a horizontal plane where they have to be moved very carefully to exact distances because they were so light, Kumar holds them up with the help of micro-magnets that are not caught by the camera. And to translate imagination into exact movement, he teaches students to calculate the precise degree of movement on coordinates, which remain invisible to the camera.

But perhaps the most reassuring thought about Kumar's technique is that he combines the age-old manual method with the latest in digital technology, thereby making it possible even for non-artists to become prize-winning animators. This he does, while at the same time cutting down on the prohibitive cost of digital animation and on processing time because he no longer needs to use film.

The results of the digital camera can be seen within minutes of shooting. A fine example of that is his collection of seven short films made by his students at the last workshop, of whom six "couldn't draw a line." One, the young Mass Communication student Shubhra Joshi, has gone on to be short-listed for the Amsterdam One-Minute Film Festival with five others in the animation section, chosen from across the world!

Kumar, who left home at an early age, was nurtured by Ritwik Ghatak with whom he "apprenticed from Bari Theke Paliye to his last film, Jukti Tokko Goppo, in some capacity or the other".

He remembers with fondness his association with Uday Shankar with whom he worked closely on his bi-medium classic, Shankarscope. More recently, with painstaking patience, he restored, virtually by the frame, Tagore's only film, Notir Puja, which the Master directed, acted in and produced. His contribution to the safekeeping of Tagoreana for posterity has been acknowledged by Viswa Bharati.

But the influence of these masters runs far deeper than tangible film records. As he acknowledges, "I have received lots of kindness through life." It is so much a part of his being, that Kumar refuses to patent his two inventions in animation technology, pointing out that they are his "offering to the next generation for all the good things I have received".

With a lifetime of excellent work behind him, today he is able to smile proudly and say, "What better time than in the autumn of one's life, to give something to the next generation?"

But Kumar's classes are open only to a select few. The man who shuns pre-conceived notions teaches only those who sincerely want to convey a point through animation film, rather than those with a background in fine arts. "If you have an intense dream and you have patience, you can become an animator," he chuckles.

If that's a challenge he throws to the world, here's one for him too... to translate into animation film his brilliant bi-lingual play, Reineke Fox.

Picture by the author

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