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Bapu (born Sattiraju LakshmiNarayana ( సత్తిరాజు లక్ష్మీనారాయణ) on December 15, 1933) is an Indian film director, known for his works in Telugu cinema
He is a music artist, painter, cartoonist, and designer. He has directed the 1976 Telugu film, Seetha Kalyanam which was screened at the BFI London Film Festival and Chicago International Film Festival in 1978.Bapu's 2011 film Sri Rama Rajyam had a special screening at International Film Festival of India on November 28 2011
Painting
Bapu introduced a painting style of simple bright colors. His unique style consisted of economy of strokes, freehand drawing and a lack of background clutter.
His paintings focus on Hindu mythological characters, and he has painted the Hindu epic Ramayana as a pictorial story. His character portrayals, such as Shiva, Bhima, Duryodhana, look distinctly male with wide chests, large jaws and large biceps; while Krishna and Rama are more feminine in build. All his female characters have doe eyes, a waist-hip ratio of 0.7, voluptuous breasts, long hair and a sharp nose. The phrase Bapu Bomma ("Bapu's painting") has become synonymous with a beautiful Telugu girl. Another character called Rendu Jadala Seetha ("Seetha with two plaits") became a synonym for any girl wearing her hair in two plaits.
Bapu has also introduced a new style of cursive writing in Telugu. The font is his own handwriting and reflects the same simplicity as his art.
Bapu paintings also decorated the cover pages of many magazines in India and Abroad. Telugu Naadi Magazine published from USA for Telugu audience have published Bapu's great paintings. Bapu also later served on their advisory board to guide and have an outstanding content for the magazine that catered to Telugu people.
Cinematic style
The most notable achievement in Bapu's movie making is his success in capturing the nativity of the Telugu people and translating it into visuals. His movies center on realistic family issues and relationships, however his recurring theme is magic realism, with vignettes of mythological characters aiding in the narration.
Most of his movies have a female protagonist; a breakaway style from the formulaic movies that relegate female lead characters to song and dance numbers. His penchant for preserving the Telugu nativity in his movies can be seen in the choice of artists, especially the dusky female leads and weak villains.
Collaborations with other artists
He worked with Satyam Sankaramanchi and drew 101 pictures for each of the stories in Amaravati Kathalu. Bapu is one-half of the Bapu-Ramana (Mullapudi Venkata Ramana) pair that made movies in Telugu cinema. Ramana provided an able foil, providing script and dialogue to suit Bapu's visuals. Bapu collaborated with Ramana to give life to Ramana's character Budugu in the form of pictures. Through his movies he brought to focus renowned artists such as Ravu Gopal Rao, Rajendra Prasad and Aamani.
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