Kerala School of Art is the pioneer Art school in north Malabar, founded way back in 1933 by Late Sri. C.V Balan Nair, an accomplished artist as well as a zealous promoter of ‘Kalari’, the indigenous martial arts of Kerala. In 1933, India was still under British rule, and Thalassery was one of the power centres of the British under the Madras Presidency. Having recognized first by the Madrass Technical Education Department, and later, by the State Board of Technical Education, Kerala, the course run by the school underwent name changes such as MGTE, KGTE, KGCE etc, and presently, the course is having the name ‘KGCE( Fine Arts and Animation)’with two years’ duration.

Balan Nair had already completed his studies at the Govt. Institute of Fine Arts Thiruvananthapuram , when he conceived the idea of starting an Art School in Thalassery. In the Institute, he was trained by NN Nambiar, a leading artist of eminence at that time. Having developed a deep appreciation for artists like Jamini Roy, and the nationalistic art ventures like Shanti Nikethan , Balan Nair decided to do his part by starting an Art School to provide an affordable course to the talented children of the Malabar region, as there was no Fine Arts institutes in the area. He had to borrow 45 rupees from his mother to buy materials to start the school. That single act of philanthropy has since been providing multiple benefits to the society in the form of countless number of creative works and thousands of jobs in the teaching, freelancing, advertising, applied art, Graphics and animation fields. The name of the school was ‘National School of Arts’ at first. It was changed as ‘Kerala School of Arts’ after one year.

Living up to the grandiose vision and profound wisdom of Balan Nair, The institute has been creating numerous artists of high stature who worked in different parts of the world in various fields from freelancing to technical drawing and computer aided creativities and films. Hundreds of them have won national and State recognitions in their respective fields. The list of successful artists among the alumni of Kerala School of Arts is too long to be given here in full. However, The Principals and teachers of subsequent times and the managers since the administration of the school was handed over to the Registered Society, should be mentioned, as they have done the great service of maintaining the school at it’s original unchallenged position till to date while being creative artists, Art critiques and eloquent speakers themselves.

After Balan Nair, several of his talented pupils like KK Warrior; KK Narayanan Nambiar; Saratchandran; Velayudhan; KV Vijayan; Viswanathan; N Ananthan; T Ananthan; PS karunakaran; KP Somasundaram; & AV Venugopal have acted as Principals and teachers in this school. A. Sathyanath, well known artist, who has been teaching in the school for over three decades, is the present HOD . Ponmani Thomas, noted painter, is the Present Principal. The administrative roles were handled by eminent artists and personalities like KK Marar, CV Ramachandran, Sreenu Gopalan Master, Sankaranarayana Marar, M Padmanabhan Nair, and Selvan meloor. Pradeep Chokli,versatile artist and noted Cene- Art Director, is the present secretary. Ebi N Joseph, eminent painter and educator, is the present President of theSociety, and he takes the additional charge as Manager of the school.

The school is now set for the next phase of it’s expansion by adding more infrastructure and facilities. We, at kerala School of Arts, are committed to continue this service as envisaged by it’s founder, by imparting quality art education at affordable cost to budding talents.