Francis Kodenkandath is an Air Intelligence Officer at the International Airport Kozhikode, Kerala, but he has also a very distinct talent that is poles apart from his professional career. He is a well known artist whose brush wields a very powerful impression of images that draw inspiration from ‘things just seen in passing’. His First Supper (oil in canvas) won him the 1993 Lalit Kala Akademi Award. Later works which won acclaim are the musical notes sa –re-ga-ma-pa-dha-ni-sa that he represented with the seven colors of a rainbow and the ‘Last Supper. But what is now drawing attention is his theory of the misinterpretation of the painting of the ‘Last Supper’ in Dan Brown’s novel ‘The Da Vinci Code’. "I am no one to evaluate da Vinci. It is just that when someone like Brown tries to misuse da Vinci for his own personal gains, I am urged to put in a humble attempt to explain and expose the positive aspects of the works of one of the greatest artists the world has seen," Francis, is quoted to have said in an interview for an India publication. For his interpretation click here

Francis is the brother of local cartoonist Thomas Kodankanath, who recalls the family’s first introduction to the art “It was our father, a retired Professor of Chemistry, who first noticed the talent in my brother early on...and he sent my brother for a short formal training in the artistic fundamentals. When Francis left these classes, the younger sibling Thomas played with the paints and drew cartoons. As a youngster, Thomas remembers, he pretty much followed his brother, playing hockey for college and Calicut University and going to most of the art competitions together. Art was taken seriously only be these two in a family of 6 siblings. Says Thomas “I did my first cartoon during our "formal" study hour and hence I was afraid to show it to anyone and get an opinion. But since I was very close to my brother, I took the chance and showed it. He immediately laughed at it and forced me to show it our father....and I did. It was my father who forced me to send it to the news paper, The Express where it appeared the next day”.

Francis Kodankandath has had solo exhibitions at Japanese International Cultural Cooperation Agency (Tokyo, Japan); International Centre for Theoretical Physics (Italy); New Heaven City Art Gallery (USA); University de-Joseph Fourier (Paris); River Date Art Gallery (UK); Newman Centre University of New Orleans (USA); Jahangir Art Gallery (Bombay); Alliance Francaise (Bangalore) and the Lalithakala Academy Art Gallery (Kerala). His paintings are in the collection of the late Mother Teresa, Medha Patkar and Padmashri Mohanlal.

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