Nitheen Ramalingam is an Indian Visual Artist and educator currently based between Vadodara and Chennai, India.
Primarily a drawer and a painter, he is interested in exploring themes such as alienation, social class and identity using a historical lens and a figurative language. His recent exhibition venues include the Method Gallery, Delhi, India, Sacramento City Hall (Solo Show) and The Verge Center for the Arts in Sacramento, CA, USA. In the past he has exhibited in several venues such as The Maria Manetti Shrem Museum of Art, CA, USA; Stroom Den Haag, NL; Conflictorium-museum of Conflict, India; and Kintex Art Asia, Korea. He was recently an Artist-in-Residence at The Space Studio Baroda, Vadodara, Gujarat, India. In the past he has been a resident at The Verge center for the Arts, Sacramento, CA, USA and has had studios and received mentorship from other institutions such as The Lalit Kala Akademi Regional center, Chennai, India and Khoj international Artists Association, New Delhi, India.
Born in Chennai, India, he graduated from the Art Studio MFA program at University of California, Davis, USA in 2024. He has also received BVA in Painting with a minor in Printmaking in 2018 and MVA in Painting in 2020, both from the M.S University of Baroda, Vadodara, India
Artist Statement
Through figurative paintings and drawings, I have been meditating on people and their surroundings. An underlying aggrieved energy, perhaps reflective of my concerns with alienation, oppression, and emancipation runs through these works.
The current body of paintings are based on witnessing the commemoration of the Kilvenmani martyr’s day. I am striving to express viscerally the embodied unity and joy that I experienced in the organized oppressed people. Here I am also meditating on the factors and reasons surrounding the decline and failures of this movement in recent history.
On Christmas Eve, 1968, the village of Kilvenmani in the Nagapattinam district of southeastern India witnessed a horrific massacre. Under exploitative and unequal land relations, the peasants had become organized and militant; frustrated, one of the landlords and his henchmen killed 44 landless laborers by setting them on fire inside a hut.
Since then, this region where my forebearers are from has undergone several waves of land redistribution, thereby transforming social relations. The day is now remembered with organized strength and joy by the peasants and the others in the region. I witnessed this in 2021.
Using pastels and charcoal along with oil painting, I am meditating on the scenes of the commemoration. The character of the media lends itself to express a sense of passion and hope simultaneously with a gloomy undertone. While painting, I carefully look at the photographs and screen shots of the videos I recorded while being part of the event. During the process, I begin to see and think more - the gestural marks, the light and dark values, and the overall colour palette begin to convey important information and feelings without my prior planning. They could be the time of the day, the bustle and dynamic movement of the people or even an eerie emptiness. These visual elements express my meditation.