Graphic Novelist
Amruta Patil
Amruta Patil (born 19 April 1979), writer and painter, is the author of graphic novels Kari (2008), Adi Parva: Churning of the Ocean (2012) and Sauptik: Blood and Flowers (2016). Kari is a tale about friendship, love and death; its eponymous queer heroine steers through Smog City, a magic-realism version of Mumbai. Adi Parva is based on the Mahabharat, the Puraans and the tradition of oral storytellers and its sutradhaar is the river goddess Ganga. It was selected as one of 2012’s best graphic novels by comic book historian, Paul Gravett.
After Adi Parva, Patil returns with more revisionist retelling of epic lore: in Sauptik, the Kurukshetra war is long over; Ashwatthama, warrior with the unhealing wound, looks upon the worlds he once knew. The narrative, with lush and playful visuals, is an ecological tale as much as it is a mythological one – emphasizing our forgotten connection with the elements, rivers, forests and soil. Sauptik was one of Amazon India’s Memorable Books of 2016.
Amruta has a freewheeling visual style that incorporates acrylic painting, collage, watercolour and charcoal. Recurring themes in her work include memento mori, sexuality, myth, sustainable living, and the unbroken thread of stories passed down from storyteller to storyteller through the ages.
In March 2017, Amruta Patil received a Nari Shakti Puraskar at the hands of the 13th President of India Pranab Mukherjee for “unusual work that breaks boundaries” in art and literature.
