Theertha has supported regional art groups to emerge in selected communities in the past 3-4 years.  We have done it mainly with the help of art teachers through art teacher training workshops in these areas where they have become the link to the artists and art students. In doing so we have also seen the possibility of establishing a much larger impact or reaching a larger community had our programs been more community oriented. More recently, we have included strategies that are community oriented rather than specifically art practice oriented.  Some of theertha programs therefore use visual art as a tool for understanding and intervening on awareness building in art, investigating culture and managing heritage within selected communities that goes beyond mere art into the realms of cultural management. At the same time another emphasis that Theertha has is that these communities itself to become the depository of their own cultural knowledge.  We believe that this approach would have a larger reach and be effective in transforming opinions on art that would be informed of more current art knowledge and information.  At the same time the Theertha hope that such program would effectively support group dynamics in communities which would help for new art groups to emerge and that their intervention within the communities will be better understood. 

In addition, Theertha has invested lot of energy in art educational initiatives, specifically school level art education to further support regional communities in accessing art knowledge. Some of them have been large art projects that have proved to be highly successful in capturing a large audience and disseminating art knowledge.


•    ‘Sri Lankan Visual Art of the 20th Century’- Educational Art Exhibition
•    ‘Ape Gama’ (Our Village)- Drawing the Cultural Map