Sara Abraham, the doyenne of up to date Indian Artwork within the early Seventies, handed away peacefully, within the early hours of August 4, 2024 at Chennai.
Mariam Ram was along with her throughout her final hours, accompanied by her husband N. Ram.
Born into the distinguished household of Chalakuzhy Paulose Matthen and his spouse, Eliamma Matthen in Travancore, Kerala, because it was then recognized, Sara was considered one of eight youngsters.
Her father, Ok.P. Matthen was Managing Director of the Quilon Financial institution which ultimately grew to become one of many largest non-public banks in India, The Travancore Nationwide and Quilon Financial institution.
Sara’s father ultimately moved to Madras, the monetary hub of South India which was then the British capital of the Madras Presidency.
Sara, who was then eight years outdated, remembers the time the household lived in a big Madras Backyard home, as these had been recognized, on the tree-lined suburb of Chetpet bordering the Cooum River.
In time, Sara and her 4 sisters had been despatched to an Anglican boarding college in Darjeeling. That is the place Sara found artwork underneath the steering of an impressed artwork instructor. That early initiation, created in Sara the singular eye and instinctive capability to acknowledge authentic expertise, throughout her later years as a collector and promoter of Indian artwork in its post-Independence evolution.
In a while, she was a component time scholar on the Authorities College (now School) of Arts and Crafts, Madras. Ok.C.S. Paniker, the Principal who went on to discovered the Cholamandal Artists’ Colony, included Sara in his vibrant collegiate of artists. In an identical method, she was capable of join with Ok.G.Subramanyam, or Manida, as he was to stay her mentor, when she went to Calcutta.
An early marriage to P.Z.Abraham allowed her the privilege of residing in Bombay the place she had maybe essentially the most exhilarating encounter with the younger M.F. Husain. It was a time when fashionable Indian artwork and a brand new technology of artwork collectors had been simply starting to acknowledge the explosion of creativity within the nation.
It couldn’t have been a greater second for an individual of Sara along with her distinctive imaginative and prescient to have the ability to nurture and create what would change into her journey of discovery. The Kala Yatra, as she named it, grew to become a moveable feast of up to date Indian Artwork in all its manifold selection.
Sara Abraham spent her final day, taking part in ‘Single Persistence’ surrounded by her Kala Yatra buddies framed throughout the partitions at her residence in Chennai, not removed from the Adyar River.
She leaves behind her daughters Mariam, Elisheba and her son Kuruvilla and their households.
