The Hapless Jew

The humiliated and humbled Jew or Christ of German Matthias Grunewald’s iconoclastic The Mocking of Christ - he has not the divinity of a charlatan or the exuding of some messianic charm, no kingly jest or witty repartee like Socrates to impart, no romantic Hollywood aura or charismatic halo about him, no premonitory brave defiance fitting of a martyr, no passionately clenched fists, in short he has been broken and he has given up, his hands instead are hapless, hanging loose and lax like erogenous conductors splayed toward his neighbours, showing perhaps the only vital signs of life, as he may, just may have been trying to communicate the word of God by touch like in The Creation of Adam as he soon would be mounted for posterity as the invisible hand, while the one extended foot has bulging serpentine nerves lassoed about jutting and poking bones also like a terrain of power pylons, all portending instead an image from the Arab Spring, a panic stricken and terrorized man literally shitting his pants in a moment of extreme unction and agony being dragged kicking and screaming, making a last ditch attempt at communicating a muted plea bargain with a bowed and slanted head with his mouth lidded and puckered towards a largely unappreciative audience of open mouthed vampires in a bloodthirsty stupor, each face filled to the brim with glee, leering at this spectacle of festivity, while that white blindfold symbolizes not only the crown of thorns but also that ever hunted blind deception of Aryan life – the ideal, one of purity and cleansing in this the hour of the merchants and their coronation, the bloody coronation of a godly con or ungodly son.

- Ruwan Laknath Jayakody

The Naked Mara

Never has the irate personality and the very public comodification of insanity and the catatonic de rigueur that dwells within madness been articulated in a more terrifyingly blunt, brutally visceral, scathingly wrenching, hauntingly isolated and privately agonizing manner as in my personal favourite Francisco Goya’s 'Saturn Devouring His Son', 'Witches' Sabbath (The Great He-Goat)' from the Black Paintings, ‘Witches’ Flight’ and in the 'Yard with Lunatics' (in the order of presentation below), all painted from the interior while in a frenzied fever dream of a very private purgatory. 

Saturn Devouring His Son

Note the limpid, gaping and bulging orifices of an agitated and exuberant Saturn, engulfed in the piety of an almost necrotic darkness which poses his pitiful plight with a somnolent aura, as he holds his son’s vertebrae in a vice like grip almost like breaking bread in half in this cannibalistic painting (first in the present order) done on a wall, while the second painting also done on a wall, with Satan and a coven of witches in a disarrayed pentagram exuding a sense of disorientation is in actuality the artist’s liberal tendencies railing against the conventions of then Spain with parallels that can be seen later echoed in Salem and in McCarthyism. 

Witches' Sabbath (The Great He-Goat)

Witches’ Flight

Yard with Lunatics

The final painting, well it is the wracking sweat of a nightmare, with the calisthenics of despair in a visual mutiny of a very acute and palpable spasm of fear. In our darkest hour.

- Ruwan Jayakody

Colombo International Theater Festival 2012

Colombo International Theater Festival will be held from 26th March - 2nd April 2012 at the British School Auditorium. While the main performances will be held at British College Auditorium there will be a series of workshops and lecturers at Goethe Institute in Gregory's Road.

The festival will host a number of International Theater productions from countries such as Australia,Germany, Indonesia, Iran, Pakistan, India etc. We had a little chat with the festival director M.Safeer who with is Inter Act Art Foundation is putting in an amazing effort to make this event a success. M.Safeer has been in the Sri Lankan Theater industry for over 20 years with much experience and has pioneered in this with a hope of creating a turning point in the Sri Lankan Theater industry.



We are in the process of doing a few more interviews and documenting some of the efforts that are going into making this event a success, anyways below we have shared the performance schedule and you could gain more information about ticket reservations from their facebook page.


Colombo International Theater Festival  - Performance Schedule

26th March	Changeable Cohesion - Germany             Choreographer – Gerda Konig Concept - Gustavo Fijalkow/ Gerda Konig
27th  March	The Old Man and The Sea - Iran  Director - Zahrasadat Aziminia (Iran’s Sayeh Theater Group)	Passengers – Sri Lanka  Director - Ronika Chamali / S.Leelawathi (Janakaraliya – Theater of people)
28th March	Sitabo Lalang Lipa – Indonesia Director - Muh.Saeful (UKM Seni dan Budaya Talas)
29th  March	Chutti (Story-telling theater) - Delhi       Director - Dr.Ashish Ghosh (Anant Theater Group)
30th  March	Talk is Small (a play with scrabble) -Australia      Director - Brendon O’Cannel (Big One Little One)	Elfi - Sri Lanka    Director - S.Dayalan (Inter Act Art Black Box Theater)
31st March	Akhiyan Walio (People with eyes) - Pakistan      Director - Aamir Nawaz (Maas Foundation - Pakistan)
01st April	Dangalnama – Pune, India Director - Pro. Vidyanidhee Vanarase (Flame School of performing arts)
02nd April	Caged - Sri Lanka              Director - M.Safeer (Inter Act Art Black Box Theater)

Real men don't harass women

Found on Hollaback Mumbai, an absolutely brilliant comic I found drawn by Tory for a pre-teen on how to deal with perverts and the aftermath. Really, really REALLY wish someone had told me all this those days! Sigh. Please share with your girlfriends, sisters and cousins 'cos you never know when a desperado lies await to prey on them.

Amaarisge Ethnocentrism+Marketing

Ethnocentrism is the tendency to believe that one's ethnic or cultural group is centrally important, and that all other groups are measured in relation to one's own.- Wikipedia
Inspired by Barbara Kruger's Work

Da Bass Factor - Elethnography ( Download the album for Free)

So the year is coming to an end and we at Mathawaada thought of gifting our readers something special, :D.

Well..its just that you can now download the debut album from Da Bass Factor for free on rapidshare or mediafire. The album Elethnography is a composition of 5 ambient/electronica songs we have done in the last few years. Most of the songs were available on myspace and reverbnation for along time for online streaming, but we thought of releasing the full album for downloading since we are planning to come up with few more singles. :D

You could listen to some of the songs from Reverbnation Music Player on the sidebar on the right hand side.

If you would like to donwload just some of our singles you could visit our reverbnation profile and check out some of the released singles for free downloads. You could also check us out on Myspace, and support us on Reverbnation.

• Download Elethnography on MediaFire 

• Download Elethnography on Rapidshare

Enjoy and also please feel free to forward any comments!!!

- Da Bass Factor

Sri Lankan Art – Teek wechcha ape kalaawa!

In recent conversation with my fiancé, the point came in to the surface whether I’m losing my depth in art or not. Simply my answer was that now I’m more influenced by the stuff like Kill Bill, Demon Ananda’s pulp novels and Cowboy Bebop, so my motive now is to bring that atmosphere and tone in to our audience in any way I do art. That’s why I tend to look for Monroe and Jimi Hendrix in the stencil graffiti and more unorthodox concrete style in my poetry.

In Sri Lanka, virtually every art form is dominated by the work which consists of certain degree of visible depth and similarity to the reality. In films the applauded ones are reality based dramas directed by well renowned, award winning directors. The mainstream films lack everything, even a moderately good, original plot. In Sinhalese Literature the good ones are tend to be the translation of famous novels, and better original work is mainly popularized by the reality based themes. You can’t see western best selling kind of paper back thrillers or sexy pulp novels here. In drama – it’s same, In TV- it’s same, In paintings and drawings- it’s same. Damn-I’m bored… Even the Sri Lankan English Language drama and literature scene is not getting enough attention though they are trying to be different and more creative than their native counterparts. Why Sri Lankan film makers not doing horror movies? Why they are not going for simple romantic movies which are set in suburbs and based on ordinary people without sticking to weary bollywood formula? Why don’t writers try raunchy subjects and thrillers? Where’s Sri Lankan original techno, rave, trip hop, electronic or computer instrumental music?

What is the reason for this homogeneity? Is it because we are intellectually bankrupt? Or lack of finances for the innovation because of less audience and market scope? I don’t know… but the point which is important is that Sri Lankans try to be on the middle path to get the maximum benefit- not going to the extreme experimentalism or to the massive meaningful crowd pullers. Even if they go for either sides (very few) most of them are incorrect approaches or being neglected by majority which is not the case in other art-rich countries.

I hope somebody would break the shekels. I hope I will see the work similar to Quentin Tarantino here, the turntabilism, the pop art, simple romantic (not bollywood-formula bullshit) and trashy horror movies, and more street art too…

Oh baby! I have a dream…



(P.S. - Thanks for Somea and my fellow juniors in Uni for popularizing the word “Teek” and the word and usage borrowed from them.)

Russian illustrations

When I was young, my dad was away at work a lot. Amma worked as a teacher so most of my time was hanging out with Seeya. He had and has a voracious appetite for reading so I’d say 80% of our time was spent in libraries. I vividly remember getting lost in British Council, bawling my eyes out and finally being reunited with him. He looked down at me briefly and then went back to his book with not so much a shrug.

We also frequented the municipal library, the little libraries built in almost every major town. Our library wasn’t major though, it had a jam tree in front of it, a tuk-tuk park and a Buddha statue next to it. But it had ALL the daily papers to which Seeya honed in like a bee to well…honey. He and I sat in our little dingy corners, him with his nose on the papers, and me sitting in little colourful chairs going through children’s books.

One day I found a stash of old Russian children stories, which bring me to the point of this post. Most were translated to English and a few to Sinhala. I assume now that they were gifted by our great comrades in friendship and delivered to all the public libraries and government schools to remain untouched until someone like me came along.

They were pretty addictive and now that I look back, quite distinctive in its art. Most had stories with wolves and foxes in them. (quite mystical) or stories based on environments with snow storms and ice (quite alien to a Sri Lankan kid). But I poured over them because most of the Russian folk stories had a weird sense of magic in them. I suppose it’s the combination of dark woods, the unknown and then a happy ending at the end.

I found some similar ones on a flickr link too.

Maybe I’ll look for a few publications to keep for myself. For nostalgia and for the love of the distinctive art.

Art Walk 2009 Hits the Streets!!!

Well guys Art Walk 2009 will be held this Friday at Park Street Mews. You might catch us from Mathawaada with our own little segment..:D. Will post some of the highlights if i get the time to capture some snaps......

For more info click here
And and oh if you can try to make it to the after party...;)

Elvis; the King and the Reality TV

They say that he’s the king of rock and roll. A master craftsman, the way I like to put it, in singing as well as in shrewd performance. He surely changed the whole concept of American pop culture and will be in the hearts of millions in years to come.

But my question is can we see another Elvis in future? Whether you agree or not my immediate answer will be a big “NO”. Why is this? The main reason is today’s growing reality TV trends. America started the big commercialization of the subject and it went on like a plague through out the world.

It’s true that the programs like “American Idol” paved they way for hidden talents and a lot of people got a chance to showcase their talent (or misery) for millions of viewers around the world. But the thing is that as the season changes you tend to loose track of previous guys and then focus on the new breed. Nowadays artists are like commodities; Commodities which are sold in your local supermarket. As the days go by, when the season changes people tend to look for the newer products.

The new generation of artists are more dependent because of their heavy marketing campaigns, PR gimmicks and heavily paid record deals and they can’t see out of this system. So it’s doubted that whether they can stay in the hearts of people for ages like their retro counterparts.

Banksy Revealed??

Ahh Banksy, the urban legend, DailyMail claims that they have been able to dig up the true identity of this world renowned street artist. This news brought me a tinge of happiness and sadness at the same time, well it’s good to know who the real personality behind all the mysteries is, but at the same time I think it was the hidden secrecy and anonymity that sparked much interest among the keen followers of this world renowned street artist. Though he does not openly sell his works or hold exhibitions in commercial galleries it is believed that his work has been some of the most sought after and among collectors.

Well though my knowledge on this filed may not be deep I have always been intrigued by many of his artworks which actually bore a satirical touch in it. Not only his remarkable art pieces but his personality has also gained him the reputation as an urban rebel warrior due to much of the controversies that he was said to be involved in.

Any way I picked up this news from an article published on daily mail, some say this may be just another tabloid gossip. But any way the creations of this unique street artist will continue to inspire and astonish us for many years to come.

"Mona Lisa with a rocket launcher"

Below: "One Nation Under CCTV" Can you see the CCTV camera next to the huge letters?

“Bang bang bang in your head f*cker, Bang bang bang you're dead f*cker”

"DOPE represents whatever you want it to represent," It’s the remark that came out from Edsel Dope the front man of the industrial rock act DOPE about the whole concept behind their name. They went through lots of stuff; line up changes, vivid musical influences and new forms of delivering the emotions but they manage to remain as their hero in the minds of more hardcore fans. The industrial fullness, well planned production etiquettes and crude marketing tactics; which are predominant in American metal franchise are clearly visible in DOPE’s music. That’s the main reason that attracts lot of enemies rather than well wishers in music criticism for DOPE’s sound. But they got some hidden uniqueness, a secret recipe which put this band on driving seat last 10 years or so.

Felons & Revolutionaries (1999)

DOPE’s wicked performance style in club circuits earned them a record deal in Epic. Outcome?... a heavy hearted, industrial album which defined the path of the band in mainstream scene in years to come. Their method was to keep it simple and raw as possible. Edsel and his boys want to express their emotions and to make a mark in the scene rather than doing an experimental material. The album did the rest for them. Beside not up to standard okay type of remix of N.W.A. classic “Fuck The Police”, other tracks such as “Debonair” and “Everything sucks” took hostage in the minds of the masses which eventually paid their dues.

Life (2001)

They matured with time and went to explore different paths in the music. I call it this album as more musically orientated album because DOPE tried to experiment with techno counterparts, innovative complex guitar riffs and adopting more vocal harmonies in to their “normal” blood. Tracks like “Now or never” (Slow but one of their best works) and “Nothing (Why)” earned them a position in Billboard and other metal charts.

Group Therapy (2003)

If I call "Life” as a musically driven album I’ll call this one as a lyrically driven album. Their song (lyrical) structure went on serious transformation through the process and result was astonishing. For my personal opinion, this is the best DOPE material the band ever delivered. I think tracks like “Sing” and “Another day goes by” (slowing things down tat bit… think that more hard core fans didn’t like those much) will prove my point.

American Apathy (2005)

Nothing much to say, it was a memorable journey to their roots. This hardcore bombshell took the band to #1 position in charts and I’m sure that all the DOPE army eagerly waited for this one. It turned out to be a worth while waiting because finally they got their hands on one of the killer masterpieces of industrial metal arena.

DOPE’s new album “No Regrets” is scheduled for release on 10^th June 2008