Silhouettes spell humour

``IT IS sultry here, open the window'', says one.

``I have no shirt on, it is too cold. Close the window'', says the other.

Their anger comes through shadows and then they speak to the train guard who tells them that there is no pane for the window which had been smashed in a riot.

The two, one bald, but for a tuft of hair at the back, the other with a cap and a beard, were speaking from behind a screen. They were shadows created by fingers bent and held in front of a source of light. Not just human figures but also dogs, birds, a swan in a lakes, a dancing girl, little rabbits, an elephant, deer and several other animals came alive through shadow.

Creating shadows through the controlled use of daylight, the flickering lights of coconut oil fire, wax candles, kerosene lamps and finally electric bulbs projecting shadows on paper screens, hand movement, cut outs and stencils on screens and many other refined ways of working with shadows have now come to be described as art forms.

This is what T. K. Vadivelu has done. Vadivelu created the magic of shadows for children of all ages gathered at the British Council, recently.

Vadivelu's shadow puppetry and magic show had the audience spellbound. Bending his fingers to the different shapes in front of a light, Vadivelu was able to bring in a lot of humour to the shadows. The elephant and the woman with a sparkling diamond earring were full of humour in them. The kinetic silhouette play had stories woven round the shadows.

``Humour is the bottom line of fantasy'' says Vadivelu with a straight face. Looking more like a business executive than an entertainer, with his full sleeved shirt tucked in and polite manners. ``Humour has its own magic, the whole thing revolves round humour. One has to make it a little cartoonish to bring it alive.''

Born in Chennai and educated here. Vadivelu got drawn to magic when his father brought back some tricks from a trip to the U.K. and performed some of them at home. ``Magic became my childhood obsession'' recalls Vadivelu who grew up to be a poet painter and a professional photographer. But interest in magic continued. He learnt from magicians like P. K. Elangovan, Bhagyanath and a magician from Sri Lanka called the Great Caliph. Sheer hard work and passion drew him into reading more and more on the subject and attending several conventions on magic. Raghavendra Rao of Karnataka and Prasanna Roy of Calcutta had their influence on him. And the little magician embarked on a study of shadowgraph.

``I just dived into myself'', says Vadivelu ``and there was discovery after discovery. It demanded precision, dexterity and presence of mind. And that meant long hours of hard work. My fingers got used to the pain, became supple, began to understand my ideas and bent accordingly''. This is an art form where only a light source, a screen and a dexterous pair of hands are required to transport the audience to a world of make-believe. And Vadivelu was entirely successful at that.

Vadivelu also did a few magic tricks for the children, plucking coins from everywhere and turning sugar into chocolates.

V. R. DEVIKA

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