Gayan Prageeth

Gayan Prageeth holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Kelaniya in Colombo, Sri Lanka and soon became one of the islands prominent artists. He combines intricate acrylic painting with fine ink drawings on rice paper, pasted on the canvas, to evolve a dynamic sharpness within his elaborate compositions. In his recent series titled ‘Since 1983’, Prageeth furthermore explores the art of installation, with a subtle link to the ready-made, transforming manufactured steel buckets into time critical objects. In contrast to the political carnival portrayed in Prageeth’s previous exhibition, these new works illustrate the turmoil of the eruption of the civil war through installation and geometric symbolism – a combination of works that demonstrate not only our history but also the current state of many countries around the world. Overall, his body of work is characterized by a Sri Lankan specific iconography and bears a sensitive awareness of ongoing environmental and political issues. His works have moved further into controversial politics facing the island over the past years. The subtlety with which he approaches his subject combined with a strong detail in his technique make him part of the growing trend of artists choosing to use contrast as a mechanism of representation in their art.