Koralegedara Pushpakumara 's Exhibition
'Goodwill Hardware'
The Second exhibition of
the "Theertha Pradarshana Wasanthaya" 2009 at Red Dot Gallery
will be open on SATURDAY, 14th November 2009 at 6.30 pm.
The exhibition will remain open from 15th November to 7th December 2009.
Gallery Hours: Monday to Wednesday 10.30 AM - 5.00 PM Sundays 11.00 AM - 4.30 PM.

Koralegedara Pushpakuamara is one of the initial followers of the 90’s Trend. His early approaches to art can be mostly identified as a lineup of autobiographical narrations that discussed the frustration, pain and suffering as well as the internal crisis of youth following a narcissistic approach.  That is, to present the politically, culturally and socially constructed torture and brutalities as part of one’s own tragic existence of life or himself as an integral part of such a situation. To articulate in another way, in most of his early works Pushpakumara depicts the single individual frustrated by the constantly present social, cultural and political brutalization as the main motif. In most cases, this stance of his provided impulsion for an autobiographical narration.  The uncertainty and severe pain marked by instantaneous and broken brush strokes, Pushpakumara’s lonely male figure was the central motif of his early works. It could be postulated that through this process he transformed the larger community’s  socio-cultural tragic experiences into a self centered pain or experience. His work titled ‘Figure I” is a very good example for this (See image 1).

Even though the exhibition “Goodwill hardware” at Theertha Red Dot Gallery still continue to engage with his earlier approaches that critiques the  social, cultural, political brutalization and human suffering, its main articulation form (that includes  its surface material or its’ gamut of visual languages) is built with a emphasis on ‘materiality’ than earlier. This is done by bringing ‘material’ into the artwork with their own social, political meaning rather than using them in the modernist sense of using raw material in art practice. Thereby, Pushpakumara posits the ‘material’ as the main expressive element in the artwork. In other words, this illustrates the use of ‘material’ in the artwork retaining the same meaning it has within the human/ cultural usage as well as with the same meaning they are used in extraordinary socio-cultural and political behavior at present.

If we consider Pushpakumara’s  approach as an art historical argument  in relation to  Sri Lanka’s recent art history,  it is connected to Jagath Weerasinghe’s argument  ‘philosophy and theory exist in the material itself but not external to  it’, an idea which he articulated in the exhibition ‘Charted Theft’ curated by him[i]. In that exhibition the main element of activity was thinking of art as material, things, places, weaving and making. As an example for this idea Arjuna Gunarathna’s “Tied Books” and Anura Krishantha’s “Stolen Wreaths” could be pointed out (see image 2, 3). Also, sub-meanings subliminally present in some of Pushpakumara’s works as well as certain direct meanings in his other works binds this exhibition to a deeper  art historical discourse. Pushpakumara’s installation titled ’22 Bags’ done at the first Vasal International Art Camp in 2001 well illustrates this aspect of his art approach (see image 4).

This time Pushpakumara’s thematic absorption as well as his artworks which force us into a dialog, entertains a certain confrontational nuance. The disconnectedness presented in the adjective and the noun of the nomenclature, “Goodwill-Hardware” or else the connection between the live/ nonliving aspects presented juxtaposed in the overall exhibition probes us to engage with it deeply to find the meaning presented in such anomalies. 

 It could be suggested that by playing on the duality as well as incorporating the same duality itself present in the directness and indirectness as the main objective of the exhibition, in a complex totality, by creating a fine veil of humor between foolishness or shallowness and responsibility or depth.

 It could be observed that Pushpakumara is trying to show the incongruent logic between human feeling and construction material /technology ,(and) the mechanical (or clinical)  and false connection between human suffering and manipulative political interventions.

On the other hand the materiality of the artworks that he has constructed positions us within three, perceptive dimensions.  The first, is to take the ‘material’ that are brutal in its basic appearance or intrinsic in its nature, and are socio-culturally  imbued with power to dissent or  threaten and transform them into  things that are acceptable which one could live without much trouble. His work titled  “Goodwill-Hardware 1 series” are examples of such an attempt (see image 5 & 6). The second is to take the  “objects and material” that are connected with necessities of human existence, but that has a potential to be brutalized with effort, and to cover it with a protective skin. This aspect is illustrated in his work titled “Goodwill-Hardware 2” (see image 7).  Pushpakumara’s third presentation is to convert the ‘material’ that is seen as dangerous or signaling danger into non threatening and playful situations. Such is seen in his work “Goodwill-Hardware 3” (see image 8).

 Through these three types of material constructions (human, socio-cultural as well as socio-political) Pushpakumara in his work converts  the situations and  material manifestations of brutalization, segregation/ division, alerting of danger  or signifying insecurity or temporality into things and environments  that are secure, attractive, easy, and acceptable.

It could be suggested that by doing so Pushpakuamara attempts to hint at the intensely harsh and bitter human sufferings that are dismissed from social memory and forgotten through skilfull political maneuverings of subtle as well as blatant political discourses or unrelenting cultural strategies.

Prasanna Ranabahu
12 November 2009

Translated by Lalith Manage