Karunasiri Wijesinghe is a leading artist in Sri Lanka renowned for his unique aesthetic vision and the original style of work. The main body of his work has been described as a profound cultural response to one salient theme – Nature. Wijesinghe’s artistic endeavors represent an aesthetic and spiritual exploration of Sri Lanka’s natural environment, mainly its flora and waterscape. He has held several successful solo exhibitions and participated in group shows both in Sri Lanka and abroad. We quote below two leading art critics to provide an indication of the nature and level of his art.

– He [Wijesinghe] shows us in his drawings, the characteristic configuration of trees and plants and their specific visual texture, without downplaying the subtle and fine intricacies of foliage, the shadows inside trees, the movement and shapes of creepers and plants in a forest ambiance. Behind each of Karu’s works, one can sense the long hours and days that the artist has spent contemplating trees and forests. One cannot fail to feel the presence of a silent and penetrating mind behind these works. The serene mood that these drawings have thus acquired endows them with meditative connotation, elevating them to a higher status of beauty.
– Prof. Jagath Weerasinghe

– In Karunasiri’s painting a tree is a tree but it is also much more. It reveals an inner dynamic of these denizens, in a way that a photograph can never achieve. Karunasiri achieves it by capturing unerringly a rhythm in the sculpture of a tree, and through a process of selection and isolation… He has preserved for us shards of a broken mirror which links us to a past which exists only as instinct. Perhaps the villager, who inhabits each tree with a goddess – ruksha devata – and lights a lamp in a cavity of its trunk at nightfall, is closer to that lost world still, than us. Karu’s paintings are to me such an act of worship and tribute to our ecological memory.
– Dr.Tissa Abeysekera

Apart from being an artist who has devoted much of his work to drawing , painting and pyrography, he is also famous for his original book covers and illustrations. It also may be noted that he has been commissioned by leading banks and other commercial establishments for many creative projects such as souvenirs and calendars. He won the prestigious Bunka Award for achievements in the visual arts in 2005.

Academic background

1982 BFA obtained from Institute of Aesthetic Studies, University of Kelaniya From 1996 to 2009, Lecturer at the Vibhavi Academy of Fine Arts (VAFA), Sri Lanka
2003-2005 Visiting Lecturer at the Sri Palee Campus, University of Colombo

Solo Exhibitions

2011 Vapi – A visual tribute to our ecological memory
2007 Drawings and pyrography Exhibition, at Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Sri Lanka
2006 ‘Prakurthi’ Drawing and pyrography Exhibition, Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Sri Lanka
2005 ‘Tree Life’ – Drawing and pyrography Exhibition, Deutsch Bank, Köln Germany
2004 ‘Seen and Unseen’ – Cycle of paints; Response to works by two Major Poets, BMICH lobby
1995 ‘Vanarekha’ – Drawing Exhibition, British Council, Kandy, Sri Lanka
1995 ‘Vanarekha’ – Drawing Exhibition, National Art Gallery, Colombo.
1988 First Solo Exhibition; Drawings and Paintings, Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Colombo

Group Exhibitions

2011 ‘Vruksha’ Group Show, Lionel Wendt Art gallery, Colombo
2007 VAFA Faculty Show, Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Colombo
2007 ‘Draw the Line’ An Exhibition of Lac and Brass Art, Alliance Françoise de Kandy
2004 Group Exhibition, VAFA Gallery, Etul Kotte, Sri Lanka
2002 VAFA Faculty Show, Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Colombo
1998 ‘In-Dependence’ Group Show, Lionel Wendt Art Gallery, Colombo
1997 International Artist Camp, National Art Gallery, Colombo
1997 International Artist Camp, Alliance Françoise de Kandy, Sri Lanka
1997 First Annual Show of VAFA, National Art Gallery, Colombo
1997 VAFA Faculty and Students Show, National Art Gallery , Colombo
1996 Korea-Sri Lanka Contemporary Arts, BMICH, Colombo
1995 Asian Art Show, Dhaka, Bangladesh
1985 PASO Show of Painters and Sculptors Organization, Sri Lanka

Awards

1987 Best Book Cover of the Year, State Literary Festival
2005 Bunka Award 2005 (for Visual Arts), Japan-Sri Lanka Friendship Cultural Fund