KOCHI: As a child prodigy who mesmerised art lovers and the general public with his paintings, Edmund Thomas Clint will now have a gallery dedicated to him in his hometown. Nearly 43 years after Clint bid farewell to the world as a six-year-old, the facility in Kochi will help cement the long-forgotten artist’s legacy with colours.

A serene 3,000 sqft space with white walls, the first floor of GCDA’s shopping complex in Gandhinagar, Kadavanthra will permanently display 101 of Clint’s collection of nearly 25,000 paintings, along with anecdotes from his mother Chinnamma Joseph, and photographs of the artist.

The long-term project of the Greater Cochin Development Authority was inaugurated on Thursday and is open to the public.

The gallery is the brain child of writer and illustrator Bony Thomas, whose close association with Clint’s mother helped him curate the display from the wide range of paintings she held in her custody.

Clint was born on May 19, 1976, as the only son of Chinnamma and late M T Joseph in Kaloor, Kochi. The wonder kid who captured detailed landscapes, festivals, and portraits quickly gained attention. Clint’s fame soared posthumously, as his family preserved his art and displayed it around the state. “The gallery is an act of collective repentance, for failing Clint as a society,” GCDA chairperson K Chandran Pillai said at the inauguration.