Kari To Aranyaka: Amruta Patil Explores Resurrections And Death In Her Art

“To me, there is not much difference between what Kari is doing and what Aranyaka is doing,” says Indian graphic novel author and painter, Amruta Patil. Exploring themes and motifs of death, resurrection, and the afterlife, Kari has more to it than the protagonist and the beloved’s joint suicide attempt. In Kari, the story does not end at death. “There are two of us, not one. Despite a slipshod surgical procedure, we are joined, still,” says the opening page of Patil’s 2008 graphic novel, Kari. 

Amruta Patil Explores Resurrections And Death In Her Art

The sense of keeping intimate runs throughout her stories, be it Aranyaka or Kari. “Being who I am draws me more to certain stories than others,” she says in an interview during SheThePeople’s Women Writers Fest. India’s first woman graphic novelist, Patil, talked about the imagination behind her polygonal storyline, her conscientious research endeavours, her artistic process, and how all of it has led to an enchanting personal transformation. She explains why, as readers, we need to couple old stories with realities. 

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Not fearing creative slowdown or what we commonly regard as “artist’s block,” Patil used the quotidian lifestyle - crows on her balcony, the sea breeze. Nature helps her integrate the visuals into her written word. Reading The Mahabharata at an early age, Patil maintains, “My experience is in a lot of ways similar to anyone who feels that they are moving from their culture.” Immersing herself in the world of epics during her days at Tufts University in Massachusetts, Patil knew immediately that she was clueless about the culture she came from.  

“The only way to address it was to read our own stories,” she says. Sitting far away from her roots in a Boston winter, she immersed herself in the space in which jealousy and hatred separated the two branches of the Hastinapur royal family - the Kauravas and the Pandavas. At 100,000 verses, it is the longest epic poem ever written and composed in the 4th century BCE or earlier. Amruta Patil immersed herself in ancient Indian epics for a considerable length of time until they were a part of her DNA and she became ready to tell her stories. 

Someone closely tied these stories to the human psyche and shared collective wisdom and the voices that carried its story forward. For Patil, this aspect of mythology makes itself pivotal. Its primary preoccupations are the preoccupations of human beings. “For any writer, how can you not be interested in something like that? This is not the stuff of our times, this is primordial stuff. It is something that is off the always, resonates with what we feel right now, and becomes more important,” she says. 

Yes, I knew I was the first female graphic novelist - a matter of right-place-right-time, but I have taught myself over the years.

“I did what I instinctively knew I should do. Over time, I have paid attention to the existing work that others have done. Yes, I knew I was the first female graphic novelist - a matter of right-place-right-time, but I have taught myself over the years,” she says. Reading everything she could lay her hands on, transcending the comic strip arena of storytelling. She taught herself to paint and to understand the theory of colours. “There has been an evolution. I try not to repeat myself in terms of storylines or styles with what I do. It is primarily for myself and hopefully, along the way, others will also care about their evolution,” she says. 

Inspirations

Taking references from literature, rather than from pre-existing comics or graphic novels out there, Patil derives inspiration both from fiction and nonfiction. “Typically, in a book like Kari, I could not keep out my references,” she says. In Kari, her references appear from Virginia Woolf’s Orlando and writers like Jeanette Winterson. “There is, of course, the Bible and there are graphic novels that I can use as reference,” she adds. But these do not inspire her as much as mythology does. The Christian mythology which surrounded her when she was in Goa in her childhood and even Renaissance painter Botticelli served as her sources of creative inspiration. “I even mentioned some of them in the notes,” she adds. 

One may also find resonances of the Sufi tradition in her texts. “I do not bother about purity. I care about telling a story effectively,” Patil maintains. There are all kinds of references - whether in the text or the words - all run through her body of work. For Patil, responsibility and discipline are important as an artist. “I have a background in advertising. I ran away from there as fast as I could. But, one thing that I got from the universe which I kept is certain accountability and discipline. In advertising, your whims and mood of a particular day do not count. The work needs to be done,” she says. “I am a little from that school of getting my work done.” Of course, there are good days and bad days for an artist or any creative person. If something is urgent enough to be told, one will tell it, Patil confirms. “For me, my life is not long enough. So if I indulge a block, for an unreasonable duration, I am being disloyal to the work at hand,” she adds. 

You can watch the session here: