For many years Paradise Road Gallery showcased many promising digital collage artists and their recent pick, Sangeeth Madurawala, being one of them.
His vibrant yet quite powerful thought-provoking digital collages combine energetic explosions of colors and ideas with contemporary subject matters that finally create dynamic and surprising works.
In the recent past his artistic career began to take off as he gained a following on Instagram and various other social media platforms. His pieces stand out in terms of big size and are a mix of various inspirations of the contemporary subject matters merging and deconstructing with historical events, however, at the same time remain quite authentic and original. In writers opinion every piece of art by Sangeeth creates an amazing connection and vibe of a good design that generates multiple layers of meanings.
This week, we feature Sangeeth Madurawala and his amazing debut digital collage exhibition ‘Maubima’ that will open to the public from June 9 at the Paradise Road Gallery, Colombo.
As Sangeeth explains his debut exhibition ‘Maubima’ is a result of his artistic curiosity to know what remains and what we have become in the aftermath of the political, ethnic and religious crisis that we have been going through for decades. ‘Maubima’ exhibits the hidden traumas, invisible wounds and pervert power structures that has been suppressed and tortured us over many decades.
“Maubima’ is my debut digital collage exhibition that will be open to the public this week. First of all I must thank Shanth Fernando for believing in my artistic capabilities and giving me this opportunity to showcase my work at Paradise Road Gallery,” Sangeeth told the ‘Youth Observer’ with gratitude.
Endless potential
Digital Collage as a medium of artistic expression and at the same time as a means of image making, its potential is endless. It is an art medium with an amazing capability of both construction and deconstruction. Sangeeth’s work of art evolves around the assembling and merging of contemporary and historical events together and leading towards generating a third meaning as a means of expression. Most of Sangeeth’s digital collages are kind of visual puzzles and stories that may be continued to develop further in the viewer’s mind.
Self-taught artist
A self-taught artist, Sangeeth is 24 years old and was born and bred in Kurunegala. Illustration and painting has been his ‘thing’ since he was a child. Although he is known for his digital collage and illustrations, Sangeeth is equally talented in figurative drawing and painting. Having an inborn talent for art and his constant search and following of international artists such as Hannah Hoch, Andy Warhol and Chrish Ashworth, Sangeeth was able to create in a variety of techniques, from analog collage to digital illustration, from motion collages to mixed media graphics with a unique identity.
“My desire for art has begun since my childhood and I haven’t lost my passion for it to this day. However I became attracted to the free spirit of digital collage art in my early twenties,” Sangeeth said.
The process
Explaining his work flow of generating concepts and ideas he says he starts his creations spontaneously without thinking much yet he spends a lot of time in the process of developing the artwork until he’s able to justify his concept.
“Every day I crop materials and collect digital images that seem interesting to me. If I decide on the theme, the selection will become more restrictive and I don’t like to limit my imagination, therefore, I try my best to keep it open as much as possible during the development process. Background selection is very important in digital collage. After I select a background, I arrange the materials and create a composition. Generally I create multiple works at the same time and choose the best one at the end of the process,” he said.
The visual language of most of Sangeeth’s digital artworks is defined by combining different symbols and textures that represent historical and contemporary eras. Multi-layered, fragmented imagery of Sangeeth’s collages reflects his political and aesthetic reading of contemporary society.
Talking about his interesting process Sangeeth said, “I like to merge historical and contemporary incidents or objects together as mixing these, often an interesting result comes out. That is the magic of the medium of collage and an artist it is always exciting to create a new concept, character piece by piece.”
Digital age
Being an artist of the digital age Sangeeth believes that it has created many new opportunities for artists. “I love digital collages. However, although I am known for my digital artworks I equally like to work with my hands and feel the materials. Some of my artworks that I hope to display in the exhibition have been designed in analogue. I still believe that there is space for analogue collages as well,” he said.
