Laki - Artisan

Laki Senanayake believes that the current art market is a racket like the financial market, and is based on the capitalist notion of valuing property over human welfare and happiness.

The Geoffrey Bawa Trust has assembled a comprehensive book covering a range of Laki Senanayake's artistic talents. This book includes examples of Laki's work in drawings, paintings and sculptures.

In this book of his life and work, the drawings and the paintings come across as so spontaneous, so driven by the muscular force of the moment, that one could forget that imagination is never purely visual but also conceptual.

This priceless collection of 73 drawings and paintings were done between 1971 and 1978. Completely forgotten by Laki Senanayake, they vanished into a black hole of his memory, and amazingly resurfaced in 2015, thanks to the internet.

Sri Lankans have long embraced Laki as their renaissance man, and among his thousands of creations, few bear his mark as completely as does Diyabubula, his home in Dambulla. With Diyabubula, Laki has created a garden that rewards the persistence of his uninvited guests.

Dressed in his regulation sarong and t-shirt, Laki Senanayake looks like there are few things he takes seriously – certainly, he doesn’t count his reputation as an ‘artist’ among them. “I’m assured by various people…that I’m Sri Lanka’s leading artist – God knows where I’m leading anyone,” he says, grinning.

The Art of Paper Currency provides a historical insight into the needs for money as a means of exchange and explains the stages that led to the modern banking system. Also provides us with a travelogue of 162 countries exploring the cultural, economic and political significance of the subjects depicted on bank notes throughout the world.

Barbara Is wont to swing on a candelabra, While singing Abracadabra. But faced with inequity, Her latent nobility, Comes out hissing Like a disgruntled cobra. Laki 21 Sept. 2013

Unheard and unseen, Maureen flits about the house as quiet as a mouse, Keeping it tidy and clean. But alas ! That Is more apt for a bat. I mean “flit” which rather spoils my verse a bit. But no matter. I trust no one will natter too much about it.

Laki Senanayake (1937 – ) has been painting and drawing since the age of three. He Spent the years from 1946 to 1956 in various educational institutions gathering little moss. Laki Found Art as enforced in school tiresome and devoted his time to bounding about on a diving board.