True Being

 I had a good time to visit the exhibition ‘True Being’ at the Art Circle, Department of fine Arts University of Jaffna.  Three young artists gathered the viewers together inside the gallery. Who are the graduates from university of Jaffna and also they exhibited their artworks with their group in May 2018 at Saskia Fernando gallery Colombo. That exhibition was titled ‘Being and Becoming’ and curated by T.Shanathanan.

Vimal is practicing different mediums like fiber, waste plastic objects and textiles to make his sculptures. The sculptures looks like assemblages made by the parts of human body. He tries to tell the sexual violence which happen often in his society. He discribes the human body as an object of violence. So he uses the shapes of sexual parts of the human body and produces new alienate sculptures. Catharina creates paintings of coral stones. There a lot of variety of corals in her paintings in difference shades of ash, black and blue. She represents herself as corals and she argues “the corals are look like stones but they have the soul they breathe, they grow…. But we can’t see through our naked eye. I feel myself as like coral because I am not sure about me that I am alive or not”.

Shironi makes very tiny works to take the viewer very close to the frame. She does not paint or draw them. She sews very tiny figures on a soft cloth surface. She tries to find out her identity and makes questions herself. Some situations make her to live in different places. In this condition she fights to find out her own being. She includes her own experiences and turns them tiny stitching. She uses the shapes of Kitchen utensils, furniture, dresses and some other objects in the works and composes them in a surreal view.  According the works of these three artists I could see they are trying to find the true. In the other hand if it the works look like self questioning or self talking they also talk about the social issues. In this point of view the self is also created by the society. Again we want to ask for whom or to whom we true being??

The beginning of ‘Seven Artists’

Sri Lanka has a long history of art and architecture especially Jaffna also has a strong history of it but it is struggle to keep and maintain the art culture because of the structure of our society. The art education still active in the universities and schools for the purposes of competitions and get a job with the degree. Basically the public do not have art knowledge to taste artworks the same time they do not have a good platform to see the artworks. And ‘being artist’ is just an ‘imagine’ in this peninsula.

In this condition some of us (passed out from university of Jaffna) who had thirst in our mind ‘to be an artist’ gathered together and created a group as ‘Seven Artists’ and being active now. Most of us keep practicing and exhibit in Sri Lanka.The same time we participate art festivals and residencies too. Our goal is to be role models of our society and the next generation.

Especially as the other part of this lack we got a public space (Cargils Square) in Jaffna with the support of Jeeva Perumalpillai and the management of Cargils for display. At the space we install the artworks including copy works, digital art, crafts, contemporary paintings, drawings and sculptures. Here we give chances for new art graduates and some local artists to display their works.  The space is well known for the cinema theatre, ice cream parlor, and specially KFC chicken.  All the people around the city visit to the place for celebrate their parties and watch the movies. The same time they have a look the artworks and make questions about the artists and the background of the group. And the artists sell their works to them after the shows. What we found a bit concerning is their approach mostly the kids are fascinated by the artworks and they make their parents to collect them. Followed by the parents ask to take classes for their kids and let them to continue the art practices.  Now we can feel the smell of the art scene. It is really a good beginning to build up art culture and fix it with public….

Walk with an Architect.

It is an interesting connection between art and architecture. There is a long history connected with these two things. In my early time I was interesting in art but I did not have the knowledge to understand architecture. I was around several types of buildings and I interested to live within but I didn’t capture the relationship between us. The same time my art education also had some limitations to study the history of architecture.  In my first year at the university I got a chance to study for a week under the guidance of an architect called Shayan Kumarathas. As a project in the last lesson he suggested to design an artwork for a specific architectural space. All the students including me made a sample design and did a presentation. It was a good experience to learn how to make an artwork based on the medium, concept, space, time and the atmosphere of architecture. Accordingly I studied the history of architecture through the lectures of my professors and spent more time to read the history of Sri Lankan architecture and specially wondered about the huge collections of Geoferry Bawa. In the end I raised with knowledge to read and write about architecture. The same time we have a space in Jaffna is called Sri Lanka Archive of Contemporary Art Architecture and Design (SLAAAD) where I take part a lot of talk and discussions ofartists, architects and historians. It is a good place to learn contemporary art and architecture.

 Last days I met a new friend, she was an architect student from Mumbai had come to see the places in Jaffna. It was a good time for me to visit all the architectural places with her. The crowd bus travels, long hustle walks in the streets we did in the ‘too’ hot daylight but all the time we didn’t stop talking. Jaffna has a long history of architecture of Hindu temples, courtyard houses; catholic churches an also connected with the background of colonial and civil war issues. Most of the visual evidences are disappeared by the civil war and the development.  But by chance still there are some old architectural spaces. Especially Jaffna fort is one of the famous visual elements and it is carrying the essence of whole history of Jaffna. The public library is also seen as a historical element by the historians. Our journey started from the fort and finally it finished with the Nalloor temple. The temple is well known as a ritual and traditional space. Through the walks we could see old buildings which were demolished in the civil war period and also visited to the archaeological museum.

 I could understand that we had different perspective but we shared our thoughts in a way of discussion. I interested to read the form, structure and the changing visual effect of the structure in different atmosphere. The same time I explained about my personal relationship with some specific spaces and told some stories behind it. I remembered my drawings which I did related with them. Mostly her thoughts were questionable and they were based on the background of social and cultural issues of that architecture. We shared a lot of thoughts about all these places and I knew more interesting things about the people, culture and the architectural structures of her state.

 So it is an important thing we meet new people who comes with new ideas and different perspective. It will always give good benefits to learn and understand several type of culture and lifestyle of people and it will make us to think in a new direction. And we will get believe to become stronger in thinking.

                                                         Images of Jaffna fort