Art
Creating foundations for, and inspiring visual learning inform the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Sri Lanka’s year-round online and on site learning programmes.
Our exhibition archives and spotlights engage with ‘looking’ and learning through exploration and discovery. Focussing on individual or groups of artworks, these spotlights are designed to inspire and support visual literacy through close reading.
Spotlight
W. J. G. Beling (1907–1992)
30–33—Untitled (c. 1930s)
Digital prints reprinted from silver gelatin prints
Beling Family Collection, Colombo
First exhibited in ‘one hundred thousand small tales’, Dhaka Art Summit, Dhaka, Bangladesh, 2018
W. J. G. Beling was one of the founding members of the ’43 Group— a collective of modern mid-20th-century artists established in 1943—widely recognised as being Sri Lanka’s first modernist collective. These four photographs offer a unique view into Beling’s interest in photography, especially at a time when experimentation with photographic printing techniques had barely begun. The photographs include a portrait of Lionel Wendt (1900–1944), a fellow photographer and a portrait of the artist’s aunt Ethel Swan (c.1890s–1980). Beling creates a third photograph by superimposing the portraits of Wendt and Swan. The visual effect of the combined figures appears ghostlike. Other than being deliberately playful, the photographs show Beling’s interest in the way photography could be deployed to alter reality. Such an interest is borne out in Beling’s self-portrait, where he is seen as a reflection in front of a mirror, with his head looking downwards into the viewfinder of his Voigtländer twin-lens reflex camera. A boy stands in the far distance—his eyes meeting the gaze of the beholder—holding what appears to be a light meter. Consequently, the creation of one view looking back at another view, or the use of framing devices and reflections, like a mirror or a window, is a trait that appears in several of Beling’s paintings.
‘88 Acres: The Watapuluwa Housing Scheme by Minnette De Silva’
1Fig. 1 90° 18’ 43.057 N 80° 47’ 11.726, E (2014)
Cassie Machado (b. 1982)
OHTST-Image6 copy
GPS Drawing: Jaffna to Delft, 9.30 am to 10.30 am, Boat, 10 Feb 2015 (2015)
4GPS Drawing: Jaffna Hostel (Kalviyankadu) to Ramanathan Academy (Maruthanarmadam), Three-wheeler, 12 km, 26 April 2012 (2012)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
5GPS Drawings, England 2011, Oxford to Paddington, Train, 1.01 pm to 2 pm, 2011 (2011)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
6GPS drawing: Killinochi to Vavuniya, Train, 2011 (2011)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
7GPS Drawing: Kudirimale to Wilpattu National Park Gate, 53km, 1.40 pm to 5.40 pm, Jeep, 7 October 2017 (2017)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
8GPS Drawing: Fuengirola to Córdoba, 8.30 am to 11.18 am, Bus, 9 August 2017 (2017)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
9GPS Drawing: Babaragasthalawa to Kumana campsite, 10 km, 1.15 hr, Jeep Toyota 4×4, June 2011 (2011)
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966)
10Independence Day Colombo 1991 (1991)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
11St Peter’s Old Boys Reunion, Colombo (1991)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
12Private Lessons, Colombo (1991)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
13Rosie’s Deportment Class, Colombo (1989)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
14Tourist, Ahungalla (1991)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
15Spoken English, Balangoda (1988)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
16If You Boycott the Elections the Penalty Is Death, PRRA, Peoples Revolutionary Red Army, Galle (1989)
Stephen Champion (b. 1959)
17Corridors of Power: Drawing and Modelling Sri Lanka’s Tryst with Democracy (2015)
Channa Daswatte (b. 1965), Sanjana Hattotuwa (b. 1977), Asanga Welikala (b. 1976)
20Andare of Sri Lanka (1978)
Tilak Samarawickrema (b. 1943)
19Andare of Sri Lanka (1978)
Tilak Samarawickrema (b. 1943)
20Ceylon Since Soulbury Part I: A History in Cartoons by Collette (1948)
Aubrey Collette (1920–1992)
21Sinhala English Dictionary in a Steel Jail (2007)
Kingsley Gunatillake (b. 1951)
22OHTST Image27
Muhanned Cader (b. 1966) , T. Shanaathanan (b. 1969), Chandraguptha Thenuwara (b. 1960), Jagath Weerasinghe (b. 1954)
23Purification Ritual in the Manik Ganga, Kataragama, Ceylon (1957)
Reg van Cuylenburg (1926–1988)
24Hindu Penitent with Kavadi, Kataragama, Ceylon (1957)
Reg van Cuylenburg (1926–1988)
25Hindu Penitent, Kataragama, Ceylon (1957)
Reg van Cuylenburg (1926–1988)
26Nowhere Is Now Here (1985)
Laki Senanayake (b. 1937)
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