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Vajira Gunawardena
 
 
About the Artist

By facing straight to the culture, the series of art works I have done was always connected to my “Daily Life”, which is an ultimate result of my personal feelings springs out from the social, political structure of modern life.


Daily Life is a historical event to a man who is immersed in a day-to-day life with full of vivid expectations. Daily life that is a manifestation of culture is continuously projecting various images through media. They remove the essence from the social structure and allow the media to refills the emptiness and rearrange the daily life as they wish. It is organized system. I use my own life and that of people around him as a point of departure to explore society’s obsession with matetarialism, instant gratification and our inability to confront the growing of human insensibility in the world that surrounds us. "My work focuses on my need to intersect body and place, memory and fact to re-examine human histories, cultural conditions, and events." I create art in order to document issues that are important to me. I respond to subject matter that range from daily occurrences in the media to more mundane aspects of life that are often taken for granted. I am interested in topical issues from the political and culture spheres, as well as social conditions that comment on human existence.


I work instinctively and intuitively. Spontaneity and experimentation play key roles in my creative process and I continuously edit my work until a unified composition and narrative emerges. Over the course of time, the pairing of disparate images and text collected from magazines, old children’s books, encyclopedias, pamphlets, brochures, flyers and other such sources of information, helps me recontextualize the ideas of various social behavioral patterns. What are seen in my creations are exceptionally disfigured human figures, heroes with exceptionally enlarged sexual organs, Sri Lankan materialistic fantasy, new individualism, market force, television, Consumer Goods and the figures of popular commodities in the urban life as chosen Signs with Text and word of commercial myth; I make an attempt to express my emotions of the contemporary social environment. The presentation is going to be as a visual diary. It depicts the external struggle of a contemporary Sri Lankan personality who was born in this culture.


Art is a bunch of concepts. I have developed artistic space and form with different scales on the same background. Through this I hope to express the complexities and differences of human relations. Along with brilliant color, most of my motif tries to develop or engender a deep psychological meaning based on social crisis. It has become over time a metaphor of our human existence and lifestyle - lifestyles that are not just fragmented, but are the mix of the thousands of images that leave pieces of impressions on our visual psyche as we race through a day. The shapes are organic and remixed with cartoon; remnants of life forms expressing a mystery of the incomplete and what remains to come all immersed in sexual satire. In an on going attempt to understand how color and shapes are "read" by the conscious and subconscious, I add tension. The tension (placement) between shapes and color in a composition is important in all my pieces no matter in which medium I choose to work. So, to identify my paintings as mirror reflections of these social upheavals seems to be a correct definition to my works of art.

 
Click to enlarge images
(if larger image has been loaded)
 

IF ON THE FORSAKEN LAND’S A TRAVELLER III

2005
Oil on Canvas
126x136 CM

SUBLIME OBJECT

2005 - SOLD
Oil on Canvas
84 X 141 cm

There are a bright colors and compact background but not chance for exposure human figure. You can see symbols of broiler chicken, tree wheeler, wear, TV and antenna. We are living in Market society because advertising becomes necessary to express that you should not only satisfy your basic needs; you should try to express your social status by owned a product. It's a story that many people can tell every day. Endless. Universal. Timeless. Consumer goods are not geographically limited.

WINDOW SHOPPING I

2006
Oil on Canvas
87 x 94 CM

WINDOW SHOPPING II

2006
Oil on Canvas
87 x 94 CM

LATE TOMRROW II

2006
Oil on Canvas
87x94 CM

LATE TOMRROW III

2007 - SOLD
Oil on Canvas
126 x 136 CM

IF ON THE FORSAKEN LAND’S A TRAVELLER V

2007
Oil on Canvas
126 x 136 CM

MASTER BED ROOM I

2006 - SOLD
Oil on Canvas
92 x 101 CM

MASTER BED ROOM I I

2006
Oil on Canvas
87x94 CM

ENJOYMENT

2008 - SOLD
PASTAL, CRAYON AND ACRYLIC ON BOARD
60 X 75 cm

I WILL LOVE YOU ON SUNDAY

2008
PASTAL, CRAYON AND ACRYLIC ON BOARD
60 X 75 cm

I WILL LOVE YOU ON SUNDAY

2008
PASTAL, CRAYON AND ACRYLIC ON BOARD
60 X 75 cm

READY MADE HERO

2008
PASTAL, CRAYON AND ACRYLIC ON BOARD
60 X 75 cm

READY MADE HERO

2008
PASTAL, CRAYON AND ACRYLIC ON BOARD
46 X 51 cm

READY MADE HERO

2008
Oil on Canvas
54 X 55 cm

READY MADE HERO

2008
Oil on Canvas
71 X 80 cm

READY MADE HERO

2008
Acrylic on Canvas
93 X 100 cm

ENJOYMENT

2008
Acrylic on Canvas
93 X 100 cm

ENJOYMENT

2008
Acrylic on Canvas
87 x 94 CM

I WILL LOVE YOU ON SUNDAY

2008
Acrylic on Canvas
54 X 55 cm

 
Education and biography
ACADMIC PREPARATION

2002- Bachelor of Fine Arts (BFA degree) University of the Visual Arts & Performing Arts, Colombo - SRI LANKA

2000-Diploma of product design (Leather Design) Designing Department with the Cottage and Textile Industries Department - SRI LANKA

SOLO EXHIBITION

2008- “DREAM FACTORY” Drawings Exhibition at the Alliance Françoise De Colombo – SRI LANKA

2008- “THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF THE PERFECTLY ORDINARY” Art Exhibition at the Mieke
Kooistra’s Residence Place in Colombo - SRI LANKA

2007- “THE DREAM FACTORY” Art Exhibition at the Barefoot Gallery in Colombo- SRI LANKA

2005- “MY RECENT PAINTINGS” Art Exhibition at the Paradise Road Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

2001-“GAP2001” Art Exhibition at the Lionel Wendt Art Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

GROUP AND PARTICIPATION (SELECTED)

2008- “ARTFUL RESISTANCE: CRISIS AND CREATIVITY IN SRI LANKA” Contemporary Art Exhibition in Europe, organized by The Serandib Gallery, Colombo and Museum of
Ethnology Vienna – Austria

2008- “CONTEMPORARY ART IN SRI LANKA” the Group Exhibition of Visual Arts, the Gallery Art Korner – NETHERLANDS

2007- “WHERE, WHO, HOW, WHAT AND WHEN” the Group Exhibition of Visual Arts, Barefoot Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

2007- “NAWA KALAKAROWO” Visual Art Biennale Sri Lanka, Organized by the George Keyt Foundation, the National Art Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

2007- “VISUAL ART BIENNALE SRI LANKA” Art Exhibition, Organized by the Ministry Of
Cultural Affairs, the National Art Gallery in Colombo - SRI LANKA

2006- “12TH ASIAN ART BIENNALE BANGLADESH 2006” Exhibition in Dhaka – BANGLADESH

2006- “FEB” the Group Exhibition of Visual Arts, Barefoot Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

2004- “YOUNG CONTEMPORARY” Art Exhibition, Organized by the George Keyt Foundation,
The Harold Peiris Art Gallery in Colombo - SRI LANKA

2003- “SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS 2003” Art Exhibition, Organized by the George Keyt
Foundation, Harold Peiris Art Gallery in Colombo- SRI LANKA

2003- “NAWA KALAKARUWO” Tenth Annual Exhibition, Organized by the George Keyt Foundation, the Harold Peiris Art Gallery in Colombo - SRI LANKA

2001-“SCULPTORS AND PAINTERS" the Art Exhibition, Organized by the George Keyt Foundation, National Art Gallery in Colombo- SRI LANKA

2001- “NATIONAL ART FESTIVAL” the Art Exhibition, Organized by the Ministry of Cultural
Affairs, National Art Gallery, Colombo – SRI LANKA

2000- “ALTERNATIVE DREAM” the Group Art Exhibition, Arlen Art and Craft Gallery in
Colombo - SRI LANKA

2000- “YOUNG CONTEMPORARY” the Art Exhibition, Organized by the George Keyt
Foundation, National Art Gallery in Colombo – SRI LANKA

INTERNATIONAL CAMPS

2002- “INTERNATIONAL ARTIST CAMP” - Organized by the George Keyt Foundation,
THE Village Habarana – SRI LANKA

2001- “INTERNATIONAL ARTIST CAMP” - Organized by the George Keyt Foundation, The
Village Habarana – SRI LANKA

2000- “ART WITHOUT FRONTIERS” ARTIST CAMP- Organized by the George Keyt Foundation, the Village Habarana – SRI LANKA

GRANTS & AWARDS RECEIVED

1991- FIRST PLACE, “NATIONAL HEROES DAY” Art Competition Organized by Minister of Cultural Affairs of SRI LANKA

1992- “NATIONAL YOUTH AWARD" National Youth Award Festival, Organized by National Youth Council of SRI LANKA

1989- FIRST PLACE, “NATIONAL ATHLETIC DAY” the Art Competition, Organized by
Ministry of Athletic and National Youth Council Center in SRI LANKA


COMMUNITY PROJECTS & SERVICES

2004 - Project on the Contraction of Terra Cotta Muriel at the BROTHERS of CHARITY “NISANSALA” Ja-Ela, SRI LANKA

2002- Commissioned by the CENTER FOR SOCIETY AND RELIGION to Create a “MONUMENT FOR PEACE” Fr. MAICAL RODRIGUO MEMORIAL PLACE in Memory of The Victims of Political Violence and Human Rights Abuse in BUTHTHALA – SRI LANKA

2000 - Joint Project on the Construction of Monument at the FATIMA CHURCH for 50 Th
Anniversary Colombo - SRI LANKA

PUBLICATIONS & MEDIA

2008- “PANAMA” TV INTERVIEW PROGRAMME, Young Asia Television Network, TNL TV

2008- “THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF THE PERFECTLY ORDINARY” Friday Life, Page C / DAILY
MIRROR NEWS PAPER/ May 30 –MIEKE KOOISTRA

2008- “SPRINGING OUT OF THE ORDINARY” Art scope, Page 14 / DAILY NEWS PAPER/ June 04 – MIEKE KOOISTRA

2008- “DREAM FACTORY” Exhibition Catalogue – ANURA SRIWARNASINGHE, MIEKE KOOISTRA & JEAN-PHILIPPE ROY

2006- “PANAMA” TV INTERVIEW PROGRAMME, Young Asia Television Network, TNL TV

2007- “WHERE, WHO, HOW, WHAT AND WHEN” Exhibition Catalogue

2006- “ARTEKA” TV ART PROGRAMME / FEB Exhibition, SIRASA TV

2005- “VIMASUMA” Art News, Page 12 / LANKADHPA NEWS PAPER / March 06 – ANURA SRIWARNASINGHE

2005- “COLOURS OF THE CONSUMED” Art News, Page 06 / THE SUNDAY TIMES NEWS PAPER / March 06 – RANDIMA ATTYGALLE

2005- “MY RECENT PAINTINGS” Exhibition Catalogue – ANURA SRIWARNASINGHE

2001- “GAP 2001” Exhibition Catalogue – ANURA SRIWARNASINGHE



 
Future shows
http://kooiiart.blogspot.com/
http://artsrilanka.org
http://barefootgallery.com
http://paradiseroadsl.com

those websites are display my woks and information.
 
Website:  www.absolutearts.com/portfolios/v/vajira
 
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