If you ever go the Muthu household, you must look at the top of the bookshelf bythe main door and you would find thepicture of baby Muthu with a spread of mashed muti-coloured vegetable gruel 'artistically' patterned over his chubby face. You can question whether the infant knew what he was doing as he tried to feed himself. But you can't argue with an adoring elder sister who thought that that was art and had the picture taken, framed an dgiven a prominent place in the house. The wonderful moment was preserved as part of family lore.
As with most toddlers, anything liquid and colourful would catch Muthu's eyes. He would gleefully dip his hands into it and spread it on any surface he could find. The adoring sister was now not all that adoring as she found that her homework was getting smudged*. But anyway after some months, the child overcame this devilish streak to play Holi around the house and settled down to making circles on one-sided paper with half a dozen crayon boxes received on his second birthday.
Muthu's early colouring skills were the stuff legends are made of- at least, school legends.
When Muthu was about four years old, his kindergarten art teacher, Ruby Miss,called his sister (who was already reputed as an ideal art student at age twelve) over. Ruby Miss expressed concern that Muthu's paintings in class were done only in black. No colour at all. Rather surprising for a small child not to use colour, felt the puzzled art teacher.
His sister was also wonderstruck, given Muthu's lively art work at home. The yworried that some dark gloomy secret lurked behind Muthu's sunny personality. Muthu's sister took it up gently with him at home. And when she heard his reason, she burst out laughing.
