Artist on Spotlight

Akkitham Narayanan’s art embodies a rare synthesis of spiritual philosophy and formal discipline, where meditative abstraction becomes a language of both structure and transcendence. Rooted in the sacred geometries of Indian metaphysics and refined through the rigorous vocabulary of European modernism, his work invites sustained contemplation within spaces defined by balance, clarity, and luminous harmony. Born in Kerala in 1939, Narayanan’s foundational training at the Government School of Arts and Crafts in Chennai instilled a profound respect for classical Indian traditions alongside a modernist sensibility. Scholarships from the Indian and French governments enabled him to deepen his studies at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris between 1967 and 1970, a period that exposed him to abstraction, constructivism, and minimalism in their European context. Rather than merely adopting these influences, Narayanan internalized and transformed them, channeling their formal innovations through his own cultural and philosophical lens.