Dumith Kulasekara: Visual Arts Practice, Research & Writing.

This is my first encounter with the works by one of my favorite contemporary artists Cindy Sherman. These photographic works are colossal in their scale.  The subject matter of her works as investigating the identity of the body and self and its different connotations within different contexts are addressed fantastically. And It reminds me of the works by the great tradition of portrait paintings from the Renaissance to the so-called post-modern age. Cindy's work is a good example of visual culture which I have been discussing in my studio and lecture practice at the department.  As a form of visual language, she blends it with the language of painting that marks a sign of post-modernity in art practices.  Looking at the bodies, textures, and colors very closely (I would say it n Derridain's term; a  close reading of material worlds  ) these works generate the power of exhibiting the fishing of all these contemporary materials. It is represented in the way of t...

6th International Conference of Visual and Performing Arts, Athens Institute for Education and Research, 30 May - 2 June 2016 In my second tour in Europe, I presented my research on Gustave Courbet and His legacy in Contemporary Art. This is my second visit to Athens and the second time presenting my research paper at this international conference. In this research paper, I have explored one of the critical paintings created by the leading artist in the 18th-century realist art movement Gustave Courbet (1819-1877). The painting titled The Origin of the World has been related to me in several ways. The first, it was in 2005 when I was in the second year of the BFA program, I have created a drawing of a woman’s genital in the posed very similar to the painting by Courbet. At that time I had not seen any reproduction of this image. Later, I became to know about this painting and I was impressed by the way of representing this body and the genital of the woman that we are not shown its ...