Embrace me :

Manifestation of unfettered love on canvas

By Ranga CHANDRARATHNE

Pathum Vithanage

Pathum Vithanage's solo exhibition of paintings entitled 'Embrace me' was recently held at Lionel Wendt Art Gallery. The theme of the exhibition was love. Inspired by writers such as Garcia Marquise and Paulo Coelho, the artist has attempted to express unfettered love in its myriads of forms and shades on the canvas.

His preferred medium in this acrylic which he finds creating a liberating effect on him. What is clear from the exhibits is that the artist's desire to be totally liberated from the cultural framework within which one is supposed to express one's love towards another. The artist's philosophy of love is one that which is unfettered and liberated from all cultural bondages and constraints. Pathum has liberally used surrealism and magical realism in art for his creations.

Surrealism and magic realism in art

Surrealism is an artistic movement which brought together artists, thinkers and researchers to express the unconscious. It was a quest for defining of new aesthetic, new human kind and a new social order. The movement was inspired by its forerunners in Italian Metaphysical Painters (Giorgio de Chirico) in the early 1910s. However ,the movement actually came into being following the publication of the French poet Andre Breton 1924 published the first Manifeste du surrealisme.

The core of the argument postulated in the book is that rational thinking was repressive to the power of imagination and creativity and thus inimical to artistic expression.

Magic realism is an artistic movement initiated by European artist after the World War I and was followed by second segment began in North America decade later.

The earliest phases of Magic Realism began around 1919 and preceded Surrealism by several years. Together the two phases spanned approximately four decades, with residual works after 1960.

The movement actually began as a reaction to Expressionism, Cubism, and other avant-garde movements. The first paintings were characterized by sharply focused, What is Magic Realism? - Neue Sachlichkeit poster unsentimental presentations of commonplace subject matter. Initially the trend was called "Post-Expressionism" by a number of writers. But the art critic Franz Roh used the term "Magischer Realismus" in 1925 to describe the leading edge of a strong current in the arts towards a new realism . During the same period, the promoter Gustav Hartlaub organised a large exhibition of art in Mannheim under the name "Neue Sachlichkeit" (translated as "New Objectivity" or "New Functionalism"), and it is that name that historians have generally applied to German art of the Weimar period.

Magic Realism spread from Germany to many other European countries, and subsequently to North America. Although in many ways the movement was soon overshadowed in Europe by the Surrealist movement, it flourished to a considerable extent in the Americas, as an alternative artistic current to the mainstream Abstract Expressionism movement which developed in the 1940's and 50's

Pathum's grammar of paintings

Over the years, Pathum has developed his own style of paintings. His grammar of painting is somewhat complex in which he uses bright colours. For instance, throughout the exhibits, he has used red, yellow, green and bright blue as the main elements of his paintings. He has used nakedness in an innovative way. In fact in all paintings, the dominant figures are man and woman in love.

They are in diverse positions and the colours used for the human figures are yellow and red. In a painting which is untitled, lovers are sting inside a cage and in a passionate embrace. Flowers bloom from their hearts. The male figure has been painted with red while the female with yellow. The cage in black may signify socially-imposed restrictions and system of values which the artist believes would restrict the free flow of emotions. In another painting, the lovers are masked and it is obvious that the masks are constrains imposed by society.

The artist's resort to surrealism and magic realism is understandable given the context in which he expresses his ideas of unfettered love.

A central thesis of the drawings is not only the expression of unfettered love but also the despair and agony brought about when love is denied. A common characteristic of South Asian society is that love is rather a forbidden subject even among adults.

This culture of self-restraint is something that the artist wants to be free from. The painting which depicts lovers as butterflies wielding guns amply demonstrates that desire to be free of all mind-forged manacles. The artist's use of genres such as surrealism and magic realism is appropriate given the depth and the complexity of the subject he deals with.