THE ART OF PEACE
Capturing Sri Lanka's Post-War Underground Arts Movement, one photograph at a time
I've always been on the belief that Sri Lanka's post war boom has a lot more to do with the new wave of creativity and consciousness in the country than its more obvious signs of infrastructural development. While paving new highways, building harbours and airports are important, it is Sri Lanka's underground aesthetic wave that manages to capture the mood of the nation's new narrative, beginning from the center of activity in Colombo city and filtering, slowly, into other parts of the country. Art is at an all-time high in Sri Lanka right now and I want to help immortalize this kaleidoscopic juncture in our country's history!
While text books teach children about the victors in the nation's 30 year-long war, the artists and creative people in the country help them think, feel and most importantly, do. Art in any form will always be able to invoke a more powerful reaction from people than a text book ever can.
I've been personally chronicling the post-war arts movement in the country with my camera over the past 3 years. Photographing live performances, informal shoots and also for their promotional material - free of charge as a personal exercise to chronicle this underground, almost neo-hippie movement of art and also use the photography to continue to promote its sustainability & growth. This has been supplemented with my writing/journalism skills, contributing regularly to newspapers, periodicals and webzines introducing the country to her other, more colourful movers and shakers. The artists vary from heavy metal bands to installation artists, fashion designers, classic oil + canvas painters, graphic artists and many more different species of creative people who are popping up in the country, joining in to become a part of a bigger story,that encapsulates the country's post war growth on a whole other level.
While I have these myriad photographs in my archives, I think it is time now to compile and officially document this journey in the form of a visual storybook, either as a printed medium or an online resource. The photographs are not cohesive because each artist has been captured in their own light, in their own element and I have also been trying to experiment with the medium of photography with each shoot I do with these artists so as to best capture the soul of their being and work. Together this large body of work collectively becomes a powerful narrative of what war & peace can motivate a nation to do. I have captured about 60 of the 200-something new artists and would like to continue being able to capture the entire collective to ensure this momentum isn’t lost.