|
|
 |
 |
| Sunday, 22 September 2002 |
 |
|
 |
Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
|
Art is her passion by Carol Aloysius At eighty three years of age, when most women are confined to their homes and maybe even wheel chairs, Camala (nee Samaranayake) Seneviratne is a unique exception.
Not only does this octogenarian teach music , she paints, reads and works in the garden to keep herself busy. As if that was not enough, until recently when she moved into an upstairs flat, this active grandmother was also the proud owner of four lively dogs whom she personally groomed and exercised, even managing to keep pace with them when she took them for long walks in the mornings. "I'm a music teacher by profession, but art has been my life long passion," she recently confessed to this writer in an interview for which she travelled all the way from her home at Nugegoda by bus, walking in the hot sun from the bus stop, climbing up the stairs at Lake House and still managing to look fresh and chirpy at 11 in the morning. It is this combined interest, for art and music she explains, that has kept her looking young and feeling young. Camala has been a music teacher for over forty years or more since she first decided to make it a career after completing a music career she initially began in her old school at Hillwood College, Kandy. she sat and successfully passed the Licentiate of the Royal Schools of Music (LRSM) under the guidance of her teacher Elmer de Haan for whom she has the highest regard. "He was a real musical genius and brought out the best in me" she says in retrospect.
Since then she has been teaching music, preparing students for examinations and visiting homes to give classes even when she turned eighty years of age. "I still do home visits although most of my students come home for their lessons" she says insisting that her mind is still very alert" and her fingers "as nimble as the day I first began teaching music". In fact, far from slowing down her pace of life with her advancing age, this lively octogenarian is currently preparing to resurrect the paintings she has done over the years during her spare time and put them together for an exhibition in the near future. The forty odd paintings she hopes to showcase include paintings she did under her brief period of tutelage of Mudaliyar Amarasekera, says this largely self taught artist. "I began attending Amarasekera's classes when I was around seventy years old. Unfortunately I had to stop classes when he died at the ripe old age of hundred", she says regretfully. Having got her initial guidance under this seasoned art teacher, she says she continued to paint on her own. Her subjects are mostly drawn from nature and feature landscapes and animals." I have been a nature and animal lover from childhood. Nature provides me an escape from the hustle and bustle of everyday life into a tranquil world of peace and quiet. I feel rejuvenated and ready to resume my active life once I come out of that serene world." Using mostly oils, she says she draws from real life incidents and scenes she is familiar with. "This country is blessed with an abundance of natural beauty and is an artist's paradise. You don't have to look far to find an interesting subject to sketch or paint", she says. She insists she is no professional painter but judging by some of the pictures we saw of her creations she is certainly talented and has an eye for details that make her paintings come alive. A grandmother of six (five girls and a boy), she hopes that her passion for art and painting will rub off on her grandchildren since her two daughters decided to confine themselves to music besides their studies. Her word of advice to other women of her age? "Think young and be active, mentally and physically. If you have a passion for doing anything, just go out there and do it. Don't let anyone tell you are too old or feeble. Prove to them that leading an active life need not end when you are over seventy". |
|
News | Business | Features
| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
