Sri Lankan husband-and-wife artists Manoranjana Herath Bandara and Nilanthi Dilini Perera do not just paint together, they complement each other’s themes, colours, and emotional frequencies.
Their artworks in the exhibition Two Hearts One Canvas at The Kalā Salon meld two distinct bodies of work in a unique visual dialogue that feels like a conversation in colour and form.
Dilini Perera’s palette leans towards the dreamy: soft blue hues, muted greens, delicate washes of pink and gold, displaying soft and surreal images that transport the viewers into technicolour dreamtime.
The face of a woman is a recurring motif that gives the impression of a Mother Earth figure, nurturing and quietly powerful. Around this central presence of Gaia, Perera builds a world with dense symbolism: flying fish, intricate flowers, birds, waves.
The visual elements draw from Sri Lankan traditional art brought to the present day. Perera explains: “These designs connect with Sri Lankan artistic traditions, but I chose my own colours and visual approach, allowing the paintings to develop in a personal and contemporary direction.”
Indeed, these are a visual representation of what she calls a “Poetic Mind”, the theme of her works and a personal vocabulary to inner desires and hopes.
There is a quality of fantasy in her works, yet it is not escapism. They come from her imagination, emotions, and the surroundings, she adds. So, lotuses rising from waves might speak to resilience, the gaze of women carry a serenity that feels hard-won as if they have finally arrived where they want to be.
Bandara’s world is more abstract. Whereas Perera’s works breathe and drift, his geometrise human emotion. They are denser, made from solid colours and layered forms pressed against the edges of the frame.
Faces multiply across the canvas: eyes, lips, and hands recur like fragments of human memory, experience, and presence that never take a singular form. There is certain restlessness to them.
The central subject is titled The Kiss, but not as a literal act. “It is not just a physical kiss. I think the affection, love, and a lot of memories behind that experience,” he says.
Bandara depicts the body’s involuntary response, the geometry of two people leaning in to kiss, and the result is a series of works that are intense, emotionally charged, and deeply human.
Sri Lankan ambassador to Nepal Ruwanthi Delpitiya opened the exhibition which will be on till 5 September. She said: “Two hearts, two unique identities come together in one canvas. It honours individuality while depicting the coexistence and partnership of two artistic visions which enrich each other.”
What makes Two Hearts One Canvas is more just two artists exhibiting in a joint space, Perera’s pensive strokes meet Bandara’s angular forms and the two enrich each other.
Writes Sophia L. Pandé, who curated the exhibition at The Kalā Salon: ‘Seen in tandem, these works convey the synergy that comes from an artist couple who work alongside, inspired by each other's themes, colours, forms, thoughts and hearts.’
Two Hearts One Canvas
Until 7 September
11am - 8pm
The Kalā Salon, Thamel