Removing the curtain of beauty with Chandraguptha Thenuwara
While attending Personal Structures in Venice, Dr. Sanjana Hattotuwa had the chance to speak with Prof. Chandraguptha Thenuwara, one of Sri Lanka’s most renowned artists about his work 'Covert' at Palazzo Mora. Being this an extraordinary honour for a Sri Lankan artist, Dr. Sanjana Hattotuwa and artist Thenuwara engaged in a conversation about the meaning and reflections of this installation.
What is Covert?
Covert is a sculpture of nearly eight feet in height that is extraordinary in its complexity, nuance, and layering. It is a continuation of my two-dimensional drawings converted into a three-dimensional form, for which I used iron rods and moulded them into the symbols in my drawings. If you walk around the installation, you can see right through it.
How and when did you conceive it?
With sculptures, you can connect with people physically whereas with a drawing you connect with them through the mind. When you are creating an installation, you must move around it, go through it, and physically experience the space and the work itself as you exist within it. With Covert it took me nearly one year to complete it and I think I already had a three-dimensional sculpture in my subconscious when I received the proposal from Saskia Fernando Gallery last year. The first stage was finalising the drawing, sketching various ideas related to Barrelism and Neo-Barrelism and reflecting on my previous work. Then it was about finalizing the space and getting a sense of the dimensions, which was difficult as I was working remotely. Everything else rolled from there.
Covert by Prof. Chandraguptha Thenuwara | Photo credits: Federico Vespignani
In Sri Lanka, there is currently a historic, unprecedented, and organic pro-democracy movement that was developing while you finalised your work yet there is a strong connection. In line with this context and as an artist who has been doing this work for decades, how do you feel about exhibiting Covert outside of the country but also representing the country, especially when it is in the state that it is in today?
For nearly 25 years, I have been fighting and even if society was listening it was not hearing. I am very happy to see that now this has totally changed. The movement is unprecedented, even organic. A new generation shedding old-school thinking. The whole country understands we need to free ourselves from the entrapment of militarization and extreme religious agendas.
What is going through your mind, what do you feel like as an artist seeing all that is happening?
I was here in Venice when everything gained momentum. I want to be in Sri Lanka but I cannot physically and that is difficult for me, but I am happy the young generation is taking over the leadership struggle. It is great for the future; no politician can play with them and they are not dependent on the government or politicians. We must do our own work. That is real independence.
Covert has a lot of motifs and symbolism, coupled with a design and an aesthetic appeal that is grounded in and resonates with Sri Lanka's overall complex history. How do you as an artist negotiate that contest, that struggle between creating something that is in a sense aesthetically appealing but also representing profound violence?
It is a difficult question. How do we deal with beauty? Whether it is a beautiful truth or an ugly truth you must present it in an artistic form, in your own language. I am the kind of person where my final work is aesthetically appealing, but when you dig into the work, then you start to read the motives and associations. You sit in that situation; you think and rethink as a citizen about your responsibility in society and why you have been blind. A new reality will begin and with this, you are forcibly removing the curtain of beauty.
Through my craftsmanship, because of my training, my academics, and my practice, I make the invitation beautiful so the process can take place. I have created new motifs and images with direct associations. For example, you will find Thorns, Stupas, Barbed Wire, Cotton, Lotus Buds and yes, bodies. But these bodies are unstained by blood and are beautifully arranged. It is through the interwovenness of these motifs that I represent these chaotic situations.
Covert by Prof. Chandraguptha Thenuwara | Photo credits: Federico Vespignani
Today you are a part of an entire society that is bearing witness in unison – part of a mass movement. What is it that you think the role of an artist is at this point in time?
My activism is not limited to making art in a gallery space. I consciously participate in activism for democracy by fighting for the freedom of expression, and human rights issues, and by working with civil groups. Unfortunately, I am away from the country currently. I don't want to be an artist working in a studio alone, isolated from the people, disconnected from them. I'm very aware of that and interactions with people keep my mind sharp and conscious so that I can create as a response to the current moment.
What do you think, given who you are and what you've done, the role of art should be in securing democracy?
You have to be inside the democracy. There can be no double standard. If you are working toward social consciousness and you are working with political motives, you have to be really aware of it, so that you can stand for democracy. It is very important for me as an artist to stand for human rights and what's happening in society via my art so that people can think and question both themselves and what is happening. Democracy or so-called democracy is used as a repressive mechanism by the government. With the new protests, you saw them using the police. They are camouflaging things. They are very good at that still. Still very good at it.
Covert by Prof. Chandraguptha Thenuwara | Photo credits: Federico Vespignani
There is an extraordinary explosion and blossoming of protest art from young people: cartoonists, illustrators, designers, artists. It's extraordinary what is appearing at an incredible pace of production being posted on social media as well as on the ground. As a seasoned activist-artist, what is your bias or preference? Particularly when dealing with the issues you deal with.
For me, I think reflectively because I must formulate, otherwise it becomes quite rough. There are art forms that can happen reactively, for example, graffiti and posters. My practice involves drawing, painting, installation, and sculptural work which requires a reflective period. My work is not contemporary, it is temporary. It relates to whatever time I'm living in. At the same time, it motivates me as an artist to think. It encompasses both the pleasurable and in hard times, the painful. It will take you maybe two minutes to view a piece I created, but its creation is a long process. It reflects my whole history.
In relation to Covert and discussions back home, I wanted to ask you to reflect on the past two years of the exhibitions.
Regarding what is happening now, I am already thinking about pieces for this year’s exhibition. Perhaps building on my Covert concept but using a different medium like paint. I want to question democracy and how democracy is misused. As a follower of democracy, I stand for democracy and I believe Parliament and democracy are very important things, and therefore it's a very dangerous thing when it's used in an anti-democratic moment. What we observed in 2019 and thereafter are hidden agendas or ‘Executive Demons,’ high-powered individuals who did not fulfil the people's wishes.
You can visit Prof. Chandraguptha Thenuwara's exhibition at Palazzo Mora until the 27th of November or discover his work by exploring the virtual tours online. Discover more about the artist on his profile online and learn about Saskia Fernando Gallery on Instagram. You can read the full interview between Chandraguptha Thenuwara with Dr Sanjana Hattotuwa here.