Laki Senanayake

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Laki Senanayake, born 1973 is a Sri Lankan artist, sculptor, gardener and inventor. His art ranges from representative to abstract, from Surrealist to Cubist, in media that range from watercolours and acrylics to digital art, silkscreen printing to sculptures in brass and aluminium.

He belongs to the generation that emerged in the 1950s, a period as innovative and creative in Sri Lankan art, literature, music, theatre and film as any that has followed since.

Senanayake was a collaborator of the renowned architect Geoffrey Bawa, and others such as architects Ulrik Plesner and Valentine Gunasekera, as well as landscape designer Bevis Bawa, fabric designers Ena de Silva and Barbara Sansoni and thinkers and writers such as Reggie Siriwardena and Senator R Nadesan.

He lives in Diyabubula, a water garden in Dambulla, along with a large variety of wildlife including monkeys, many species of birds, otters, monitor lizards, mouse deer, snakes and a crocodile.

When Senanayake told his mother that he wanted to be an artist, her response was to ask him how he would earn a living from that. He credits her with his decision to pursue an apprenticeship in architectural drawing.

Career Senanayake was apprenticed as draughtsman in an architectural firm, M/s Billimoria, de Silva, Pieris and Panditaratne. He was sacked for starting a trade union in 1958. At his parents’ encouragement, he took the company before the labour tribunal and sued them for loss of employment. Though he won the case, Senanayake said the company: “preferred to offer me compensation rather than re-employ a red hot head. I was free to get back to drawing and painting birds.”

Senanayake was eventually offered employment in another architectural firm, M/s Edwards, Reid and Begg, where Geoffrey Bawa, Valentine Gunasekara and Ulrik Plesner were working architects. He has said: “I was thrust into the building trade, not through any fascination with architecture, but by circumstance.” Valentine, who Senanayake remembers as being cerebral and philosophical and a devout Catholic, was in particular was an excellent teacher, and it was he who encouraged Senanayake to design buildings specifying site situation and conditions.

Senanayake collaborated with Ulrik Plesner and Barbara Sansoni on finding, measuring and recording old buildings. Their research would be collected into The Architecture of an Island.

Senanayake left Edwards, Reid and Begg in 1964 and started work in Batik textile design with Ena de Silva in the same year. He worked with Ena de Silva Fabrics as an artist-designer-director for six years, working alongside Ena’s son Anil Gamini Jayasuriya.

Collaboration with Geoffrey Bawa

Senanayake was a close collaborator and friend of Geoffrey Bawa between [insert dates], working with him on iconic properties such as the Lighthouse Hotel, and Lunuganga, Bawa’s garden estate in Bentota. Many of Senanayake’s sketches and sculptures can still be found in Bawa’s properties.

Of their relationship, Senanayake said: “Geoffrey was a sybarite and a hedonist and subscribed to no philosophies or theories. A brief encounter with the legal profession as a barrister had disillusioned him about the value of logic. He was not a teacher and had no patience with students.”

However, through the architectural drawings for Geoffrey Bawa, he learnt to enjoy architecture “build buildings, feasibly, practically and beautifully”. Senanayake is the originator of the elaborate and intricate drafting technique that had been appreciated widely (has been imitated extensively across monsoon Asia) as Bawa office's drafting style. The evocatively rendered drawings captured the dialogue between Bawa's buildings and the surrounding landscape.

His association with Bawa led to a series of artworks in stunning and important projects across Sri Lanka including sculptural work in the Sri Lankan Parliament building.

In the Kandalama hotel, Dambulla, Bawa's masterpiece where the built emerges out of the rock face, Senanayake's owl soars high above the staircase. In Bawa's Lighthouse hotel, Galle, Senanayake's railing design is a sculpture depicting the battle between the Sinhalese and the Portuguese.

His life-size wall sketches adorn Bawa's Neptune Hotel in Beruwala and Club Villa, Bentota. His works continue to be featured prominently in buildings and gardens designed by leading Sri Lankan architects.

Even after he left the architectural firm, he continued to collaborate with Bawa on commission. Notable, he provided 150 tress for the Kandalama Hotel and created the regal metal owl that can be seen soaring within the hotel premises.

Diyabubula

Diyabubula in Sinhalese means "bubbling water." This fresh water spring refreshed and quenched the thirst of many pilgrims and travelers to the nearby Dambulla Buddhist Cave Temples. The land was owned by Nimal Senanayake, Senanayake’s lawyer brother who received it is as a part payment for a brief.

Senanayake first occupied this property in 1972. Though they raised a fine crop, there was not much profit to be had, and Senanayake eventually bought the land from his brother and settled down to growing himself a forest. He weeded out over 45 coconut trees to plant trees that grew naturally in the dry zone. He bought it off his brother in 1975.

He then dammed the brook to create a large, slow-moving pool and surrounded it with heavy planting. In time it became a lush forest filled with birds and provided various settings for Senanayake’s sculptures. He also hid hi-fi speakers in the bushes across the lake so that he could indulge in his passion for music.

Diyabubula

Diyabubula in Sinhalese means "bubbling water." This fresh water spring refreshed and quenched the thirst of many pilgrims and travelers to the nearby Dambulla Buddhist Cave Temples. The land was owned by Nimal Senanayake, Senanayake’s lawyer brother who received it is as a part payment for a brief.

Senanayake first occupied this property in 1972. Though they raised a fine crop, there was not much profit to be had, and Senanayake eventually bought the land from his brother and settled down to growing himself a forest. He weeded out over 45 coconut trees to plant trees that grew naturally in the dry zone. He bought it off his brother in 1975.

He then dammed the brook to create a large, slow-moving pool and surrounded it with heavy planting. In time it became a lush forest filled with birds and provided various settings for Senanayake’s sculptures. He also hid hi-fi speakers in the bushes across the lake so that he could indulge in his passion for music.

Today, Diyabubula also functions as a workshop for Senanayake’s large scale sculpture and architectural installations and has served as laboratory for his experiments with integrated corrugated sheeting, with ‘A-Frame‘ structures made from living areca (puvak) palms and with printed tiles.

Currency Notes Senanayake is credited with designing a series of currency notes in 1979 based on endemic species of Sri Lanka. They are now said to be of high value, a few of which are displayed at the museum.

Each note was adorned with various flora and fauna that could be found in a range of altitudes from sea-level all the way up to Sri Lanka’s central highlands. The 100-rupee note for instance featured the Seldina bird which is found at about 4,000 feet above sea level. The plants and insects that share the note are all from the same elevation. Hence, the notes reflect their inspiration in their colouring as well as in the order in which various animals and plants hailing from different altitudes are placed.

Senanayake included the constellation of Orion in the night sky on the Rs.50 note in honour of his daughter Mintaka.

Sculptures One of his first large-scale sculptures was the forty-foot high bronze finished aluminium bo-leaf (of the Ficus religosa that is sacred to Buddhists) that was installed at the entrance to the Ceylon Pavilion at 1970 Expo in Osaka, Japan.

During this period he also created the large brass peacock that stood over the staircase in the restaurant of the Bentota Beach Hotel and the brass palm and plaster reliefs that graced the upper reception of the Neptune Hotel, also in Bentota.

One of the best known examples of his three dimensional art takes the form of a chandelier of silver palm fronds which forms the spatial apex of the debating chamber of the Parliament Building at Sri Jayawardenapura (1982).

Another famous piece is the spectacular sculpted stair balustrade in Bawa’s Lighthouse Hotel in Galle (1998) that incorporates life-sized coppes sculptures of Sinhalese and Portuguese soldiers fighting at the battle of Radeniya while the Sinhalese King, resembling Senanayake himself, sits above them on his throne playing the flute. It is based on Senanayake’s sketch

‘The Portuguese arriving in Ceylon under a cloud’ which hangs in No.11, Bawa’s home in Colombo.

Senanayake is said to be fascinated by the idea of biomorphic sculptures, especially in creating sculptures that live, grow and transform. He experiments constantly with such sculptures. Double coconuts that have gathered moss and a living (and growing) house in areca palm in Diyababulla are amongst such experiments.

Fascination with owls

Generally fascinated by birds and animals, Senanayake has a particular soft spot for owls and has drawn, sketched, painted and sculpted their form many times. Some of his work is gathered in the publication ‘Laki’s Book of Owls’.

He has attributed his interest in this bird to childhood encounters. Growing up on his family’s estate in Madampe, Senanayake says he heard the owls cry out at night and was terrified of them. (In his nightmares, an enormous owl stood watch over the outdoor latrine.) When his brother “foolishly” shot an owl, Senanayake got his first chance to look at one up close and he’s been a little obsessed ever since.

Style and technique Senanayake is exceptionally prolific and versatile. His sketching and painting techniques are unorthodox as are his drawing tools. For instance, he uses a porcupine quill for sketching and also creates abstract digital art.

Typically, his technique (based on that of Australian artist Donald Friend who lived in Sri Lanka) has him start off on a paper wet with water, painted and then sketched upon, allowing the colours and forms to naturally emerge.

Personal life Senanayake’s daughter Mintaka, was born in 1967, and he is now a grandfather to her son Brandon Lee Grenard Jr, born in 2006.

Bibliography Drawings from the Peradeniya botanical gardens. Architecture of an island. (with Barbara Sansoni and Ronald Lewcock) 1998 Laki’s Book of Owls. 2013

References

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