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| Sunday, 25 July 2004 |
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| News Business Features Editorial
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On the wall In a move to reach out to the local artist community and build an on On display at present are a series of silk paintings by Romaine Ferdinand. Scheduled to be on till the end of the month, the paintings portray the enchantment of landscape on the beautiful and rare medium of silk. Romaine uses water colour technique extensively in her work preferring the freedom of brush strokes to the confines of 'gutta' a masking agent that is used in silk paintings to prevent excess flow of paint. Thus this technique requires more time, more concentration and skill in controlling the paint. But it results in an unhampered flow of brush strokes that are unique in character. Romaine has taken up the paintbrush as a way to express a message of conservation, a subject close to her. It is her way of saying "preserve the beauty of this country for generations to come. If not with the passing of time, the country's beauty will be limited to those images hung on walls and in glossy coffee table books." The exhibition at GTZ is Romaine's second solo effort. The GTZ, which is offering its wall space free of charge to artists as a means of reaching out to the local artist community and building an on-going dialogue, also organises the opening ceremony for each exhibition and prints a publicity brochure and invites professionals and art lovers to attend the opening. The wall space is available not only for 'conventional' wall-mounted artwork, but also to all forms of art such as traditional, modern, woodwork, rush-and-reed and handlooms. The first to use the wall were the Theertha International Artists' Collective, with their exhibition of contemporary Sri Lankan art. GTZ invites all artists to contact them with fresh ideas on how to display their talent on the walls. ############## Barrelism and other works The word 'camouflage' originates from the French word 'camoufler',
meaning to make oblivious or conceal. It also means to shield or stay in hiding. An object is camougflaged to make it unseen from where it is situated. The modern camouflage is a result of the observations made by the American artist Abbot Thayer in the late 1800s, on how animals behave in nature. Since such animals have an outer skin of a dark colour and an inner abdominal skin of white, the colour seperation of light and darkness flatten their three-dimensional appreance, making it hard for an observer to recognise them. The idea of camouflage, as we know it today, arrives after the French Army created a seperate camouflage division in 1915. During the first world war, this army had asked artists to help develop their camouflaging.
Baralvadaya : Camouflage saha thavath kruti Barrel-ism : Camouflage and more works is Chandragupta Thenuwara's visual commemoration of the Black July on July 23, 1983 and the assasination of Dr. Neelan Thiruchelvam on July 29, 1999. This exhibition opens to the public from July 24-31 at Vibhavi Academy of Fine Arts, Ethul Kotte. |
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| Editorial | Security Produced by Lake House |
going dialogue, the German Technical Cooperation, (GTZ) has opened the
public walls of its head office at No. 6, Jawatte Avenue, Colombo 5 to up
and coming artists to display their work.
Thenuwara's use of camouflage in art prods a memory on the consequences
relating to the Sri Lankan ethnic conflict. The Black July of '83 is seen
as a main contributer to bringing the country, society and people to a
situation where thousands of lives were lost and crippled on both sides of
the war, including those of soldiers, rebels, citizens and those who can
be called the life throb of the nation viz. intellectuals, artistes and
journalists. July is here again to remind us of how hatred bred more
hatred.
