Many people know about the backwaters of Kerala, in the vicinity of Cochin and Alleppey. I spent some time there last week, and the scenery and ambiance were exquisite. The water, as you can see in these eight photos, while full of life, is calming to the soul. This man was treating his boat with fish oil.
I had the great pleasure of trekking for a few hours in the Periyar Tiger Reserve in Thekkady, next to Kumily where I have been staying for the past weeks. These twelve images taken by Santhan and me show much better than I can write of the pristine beauty in this well cared for reserve, and the amazing light all around. The picture that looks like mud is actually a recent print from a young tiger.
Gallery Red Frog, which opened in Kumily last September, presented a new show entitled 'Elephant' that drew a crowd for the opening last night. These twenty-one images capture some of the spirit of the event, along with most of the contributing artists themselves. Bravo, Red Frog and Santhan, who curated this show. The Gallery Red Frog website features some of the elephant images as well as at least one previous show. Manu, gallery owner, and artists Shaji, Martin, and Santhan are shown here relaxing after all the hard work they put in to prepare for the opening.
These thirteen slides span scenes from Trivandrum to Kumily. First you will see the Earth Pledge posted on the grounds of the museum park in Trivandrum, where I met with Latha Kurian Rajeev. Latha is curator of Gallery 360 where an exhibit showing one of the stories of Sita, wife of Rama, just finished. The twenty-seven images on canvas are painted by contemporary artists in the old temple mural style. Shown here is author Paul Molyneaux with Sita.
After my stay in Trivandrum, I headed to Cochin (Kochi) where Santhan and I visited the studio and a worksite of Rajan Krishnan, longtime friend of Santhan and featured artist with Bodhi Art. 
This ten photo slideshow reveals the thrilling inside story of work in progress. We are at Jayan V.K.'s Terra Crafts terra cotta production studio, where students from three local art schools, more than one hundred contributors in all, are helping Rajan produce thousands of clay pieces for an installation that will be included in an Earth themed exhibit at Bodhi in Mumbai in January. I made a couple of pieces by hand, and ate lunch with the students and crew. Jayan is shown serving rice and then standing with his terra cotta creation of Ganesh; Rajan beams light through smiles in a handful of these shots.
