k.k. GOPALAKRISHNAN
Tagore National Research Scholar - TNFCR (Ministry of Culture, Delhi)
Cultural Historian & Author
Kalamandalam Gopi, the ever-green hero of Kathakali
To be out soon through Niyogi Books, Delhi
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Guru the late Kalamandalam Padmanabhan Nair (1928-20078)
Popularly known as KK and KKG in the Indian art scenario, K. K. Gopalakrishnan is a known orator of art traditions and a significant source of information/reference for artists, scholars, media and research students, including those from overseas countries.
This passionate writer-photographer of Kerala performing arts traditions and culture started writing for a host of Indian periodicals such as The Mirror magazine (Times of India group), The Indian Express and the Malayalam periodical Mathrubhumi Weekly at a very young age. Over the past three decades, he has mainly contributed to The Hindu newspaper's Sunday Magazine, Literary Review, and various editions of the Friday Review.
As an eminent connoisseur and critic of performing arts, he has written extensively on arts and issues around the culture in journals such as Sangeet Natak (Journal of the Central Sangeet Natak Akademi) Bhavan's Journal (of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan), and quarterly (a well-known academic journal in English for Indian art traditions and having a global subscription including the Lincoln Library and Smithsonian Institute.) He is among a few founder-life members of Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, Kannur Centre (Kerala), a prominent educational institution in Northern Kerala. Popularly known as KK and KKG in the Indian art scenario, K. K. Gopalakrishnan is a known orator of art traditions and a significant source of information/reference for artists, scholars, media and research students, including those from overseas countries.
He wrote articles for Indian Horizons of the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR), India Perspectives (Magazine of the Embassies of India abroad) etc., and chapters on arts and literature in the volume Pathfinders: A Journey Through India's Art and Culture (edited by Devina Dutt – ISBN 8132118944, Sage Publications) and in Outlook Traveller – Kerala (on art traditions, Ayurveda and Kalarippayattu, edited by Vinod Mehta – ISBN 81-89449-01-X, Outlook Publishing (India) Pvt Ltd.)
A recipient of the Tagore National Research Scholar of the Government of India, Ministry of Culture, he is in the final stages of his third title - on the post-Independence scenario of Kutiyattam to straighten the distorted history of this art. He was awarded the Senior Fellowship of the Ministry of Culture, Delhi, for a study on Nangiarkoothu. The sole art form that KKG learned is Kalarippayattu as the direct disciple of the late Chirakkal Chandrasekharan Gurukkal, who later became a celebrity stunt director Chandran Gurukkal of South Indian films.
His critically acclaimed 'Kathakali Dance-Theatre – A Visual Narrative of Sacred Indian Mime' (2016; Niyogi Books, Delhi, ISBN:978-93-85285-01-1) was respectively third and fourth in Amazon sales in the categories of books on dance and theatre.
His illustrated academic book on Theyyam, the folk ritual tradition of cult worship in Northern Kerala that his family has also patronised for over three centuries, will be out soon from Niyogi Books. (Theyyam: Indian Folk Ritual Theatre – an Insider’s Vision).
As an officer of the State Bank of India, he resigned to focus on art studies. From December 2010 to December 2016, he was the Director of the Centre for Kutiyattam of the Sangeet Natak Akademi, Delhi.
Since December 2022, KKG has been the Director of the South Zone Cultural Centre of Govt of India, Ministry of Culture, the mandate of which is preserving the indigenous art traditions of South India.
KKG hails from a matrilineal family, Kamballoore Kottayil, in Kerala, which patronises Theyaam for over three centuries, including a Muslim Theyyam and a mosque. The origin of Pottan Theyyam was also from the estate of the KK family, consequent to an argument between Saint Adi Shankara and the less fortunate.