The stone Bodhigaraya at Nilakgama
Kurunegala, the capital of the North Western Province, (Wayamba) has a historical name ‘Hasthihailapura’ (Elephant Rock City). It was the royal capital of Sri Lanka from 1293-1241 A.D. and is full of legend, romance and history Continue reading
Michael Roberts
Dulip Karunaratne of St. Aloysius (as a boarder) sent this to me. As a resident of Galle Fort and a frequent visitor to the playing fields in front of the Fort, this bridge over a canal leading to the Municipal Park was a familiar sight. Perhaps so familiar as to be taken for granted.
Filed under Africans in Asia, architects & architecture, authoritarian regimes, centre-periphery relations, commoditification, cultural transmission, demography, Dutch colonialism, economic processes, ethnicity, heritage, historical interpretation, island economy, landscape wondrous, life stories, modernity & modernization, Muslims in Lanka, photography, politIcal discourse, sri lankan society, transport and communications, Uncategorized, world events & processes
Sired by George E. De Silva and Agnes Nell on 1 February 1918, Minette De Silva has claims to be one of Sri Lanka’s greatest achievers on the world stage. As the pictures of her with Picasso and others at a conference, the Congrès Internationaux d’Architecture Moderne, in 1947 reveal, young Minette outshone all the others in presentability and age. She then proceeded to imprint her innovative mark within her beloved island — as some of the photographs and the recent recognition of her extraordinary talent by competent personnel attests. …. Michael Roberts
Jane Russell … presenting A Memoir as one Step in a series and deploying the spelling of “Minette” which Minette favoured (not Minnette)
The whine of Minette’s white Renault as it climbed the steep curves of the driveway to St George’s [in Kandy] could be heard long before the car arrived under the arched porch. The car headlights would be switched off and I’d catch a few words in Sinhala being exchanged between Minette and Punchi Rala, a tall, fair old man, whose thin grey hair was tied in a tiny knot behind his head, a dirty sarong half falling from his slack stomach. Punchi Rala was a semi-alcoholic (kassipu being his favoured beverage) who slept on a donkey bed in the recess of the porch. Under his bed he kept a pike that had surely been purloined from the last King of Kandy’s armoury.
Filed under architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, cultural transmission, economic processes, education, female empowerment, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, modernity & modernization, patriotism, performance, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, world events & processes
SEE … https://southasianstudies.org.au/journal/
South Asia: Journal of South Asian Studies ranks as the leading academic journal in South Asian studies. It provides a forum for scholarly research, comment and discussion on the history, society, economy, culture and international relations of the South Asian region, drawing on a range of disciplines from the humanities and social sciences. South Asia publishes cutting edge, innovative, conceptually interesting, original case studies and new research, which shape and lead debates in the field.
Professor Kama Maclean: a key figure in the history of the journal
Filed under architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, Australian culture, australian media, British imperialism, centre-periphery relations, communal relations, cultural transmission, education, ethnicity, heritage, historical interpretation, Indian Ocean politics, Left politics, life stories, literary achievements, modernity & modernization, nationalism, Pacific Ocean issues, Pacific Ocean politics, politIcal discourse, Portuguese imperialism, power politics, religiosity, teaching profession, terrorism, theatre world, war reportage, working class conditions, world events & processes, World War II, World War One, zealotry
Mick Moore of Susssex University ** … with highlighting imposed within this essay by The Editor, Thuppahi
Richmond Castle is a large and elegant villa beautifully located in a wooded estate on a hill above the Kalu Ganga not far from Kalutara town. It was built at enormous expense between 1900 and 1910, by Padikara Mudali Nanayakkara Rajawasala Appuhamilage Don Arthur de Silva Wijesinghe Siriwardena, aka Arthur Silva, Mudaliyar. Were it located in the UK, it would be a major tourist attraction. It is however little visited or even known. One reason is that it has languished – and crumbled – for decades in the hands of the Public Trustee, who has neither the resources nor the incentive to promote or even maintain it. Arthur Silva left the property to the care of the Public Trustee in the expectation that a Trust would be established to manage it and the small boys orphanage attached. That has never happened.
Filed under architects & architecture, British colonialism, centre-periphery relations, commoditification, cultural transmission, economic processes, education, ethnicity, growth pole, heritage, historical interpretation, island economy, landscape wondrous, life stories, performance, plantations, politIcal discourse, sri lankan society, unusual people, world events & processes
Prageeth Sampath Karunathilaka, in Daily Mirror, 20 December 2023, where the title reads thus: “Longest mountain in Sri Lanka: How Saliya-Asokamala shaped the history of Galgiriya Mountain” ….
The Galgiriya mountain seen from afar
Filed under ancient civilisations, architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, Buddhism, cultural transmission, heritage, historical interpretation, island economy, landscape wondrous, life stories, nature's wonders, pilgrimages, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, world events & processes
Randima Attygalle, in DailyFT, 30 November 2023, where the title runs thus: “Celebrating A Revolitonary Housing Feat” ..… with highlighting imposed by The Editor, Thuppahi
Endorsed by the World Monuments Fund, a first for Sri Lanka, ‘88 Acres’, the latest exhibition by the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Sri Lanka (MMCA) resurrects the Watapuluwa Housing Scheme in Kandy, a forgotten watershed in the contemporary history of Sri Lanka that heralded a new form of social housing here at home. ‘88 Acres’ explores how this sprawling hillside development completed in 1958, was ahead of its time in providing affordable accommodation for a diverse ethno-religious community of public servants in Sri Lanka. The exercise is also a celebration of its unsung designer Minnette de Silva, Sri Lanka’s first woman architect, the first Asian woman to be elected an Associate of the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) and one of the two women in the world at that time to have an architecture practice in her own name.
From left: MMCA Sri Lanka Assistant Curator Thinal Sajeewa, Chief Curator Sharmini Pereira, and Assistant Curator Ritchell Marcelline
Filed under accountability, architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, centre-periphery relations, charitable outreach, cultural transmission, democratic measures, economic processes, ethnicity, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, modernity & modernization, patriotism, performance, sri lankan society, unusual people, welfare & philanthophy, working class conditions, world events & processes
An Item in the Sunday Island, 17 December 2023, entitled “World Monuments Fund officially endorses ‘88 Acres’ by the MMCA Sri Lanka”…. placed on web a few days back & in the Island as https://island.lk/world-monuments-fund-officially-endorses-88-acres-by-the-mmca-sri-lanka/
World Monuments Fund (WMF), the leading global independent organisation devoted to safeguarding the world’s most treasured places, has officially endorsed the exhibition titled ‘88 Acres: The Watapuluwa Housing Scheme by Minnette De Silva’ by the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Sri Lanka (MMCA Sri Lanka). The exhibition is currently on display at the museum on the ground floor of Crescat Boulevard, Colombo 3, and will be open to the public until 7 July 2024.
Filed under accountability, architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, cultural transmission, economic processes, education, female empowerment, heritage, historical interpretation, landscape wondrous, life stories, patriotism, performance, politIcal discourse, self-reflexivity, sri lankan society, travelogue, unusual people, welfare & philanthophy, women in ethnic conflcits, working class conditions
Thannamurippu, in The Economist, 23 November 2023 where the title runs thus: “Asian Monuments. What’s mine, what’s yours?Disputed monuments are Sri Lanka’s new ethnic flashpoint”
On a wooded hill edged by rice fields in Sri Lanka’s northern Mullaitivu district sit the ruins of an ancient Buddhist monastery. Members of the country’s Sinhalese majority call it “Kurundi Viharaya”. For Tamils, who are mostly Hindus and consider the war-battered north their homeland, it is “Kurunthoor Malai”. Since 2018, when the state archaeological department began excavating the site, Tamil and Sinhalese nationalists have rowed over which community has a greater claim to it.
Kurundi Dagaba
Filed under accountability, architects & architecture, art & allure bewitching, Buddhism, communal relations, cultural transmission, demography, governance, heritage, historical interpretation, legal issues, life stories, LTTE, politIcal discourse, power politics, Rajapaksa regime, religious nationalism, self-reflexivity, Sinhala-Tamil Relations, slanted reportage, sri lankan society, Tamil civilians, the imaginary and the real, truth as casualty of war, war reportage, world events & processes
thuppahi
