At home with watercolours, acrylic and pastel

Like a Sundial Felix Perera recorded only the serene hours of the period in which he lived. His tolerant brush portrayed what was best in the features of his clients and his gracious manner brought out the beauty of nature in bright splashy colours.

His paintings were tranquil because he was tranquil. His character had never become fermented with the bitterness of suffering. He underwent no early hardships. He was successful from the start. His father, a prominent businessman in Matale presented the world with four children. The most accepted of these gifts was his third son, Felix who first saw the light of the world on January 13, 1950.

Felix Perera

He received his early education at St. Agnus Convent, Matale and later at St. Thomas' College, Matale. His mother was a school teacher. He had his early training in art and sculpture under the guidance of his art teacher at school.

After coming to Colombo he joined the University of the Visual and Performing Arts and obtained his graduation in painting, sculpture, clay work, wood carving, fabric painting and turning out religious and various figures in bronze. He has undergone a training in leather work, life drawing and graphic art and photography.

As a result he was appointed an assistant production officer in the Tourist Board of Sri Lanka. This gave him an opportunity to boost Sri Lanka's image in the world by designing posters, picture postcards, leaflets and calendars, and diaries. He also had won a place in designing a logo in graphic art for Colombo Dock Yard Ltd at the world competition organised by UNESCO Asian Cultural Society in Teheran.

The brush and the palette, as well as the mortar and the pestle, and the chisel, seemed to possess the magic virtue of transmuting labour into gold. Felix infused into his pictures a 'creamy richness', a mellow grandeur of white, red, brown, yellow and blue.

The peculiarity of colour distinguished the portraits of Felix from all the work of his contemporaries. His canvases look as if they had been painted in a cathedral, in the warm yet subdued sunlight. He was honest both in his art and in his social approach towards his clients.

Felix might have been a happier man and perhaps, too, a greater artist had he been a more adequate lover. But romance and Felix were never on intimate terms.

His wife passed away leaving a daughter and him in tears. At present he works as an examiner and lecturer in art at the University of the Visual and Performing Arts. He always experiments with colour effects in watercolours, oil, acrylic and pastel. He hopes to hold a one-man art exhibition in the near future.