Colombo Art Biennale
CAB is a fantastic, colourful and exciting event that brings the Garden City of Colombo alive with Art of all kinds. It happens every two years and the next one is due to open at the end of this coming January 2014.
CAB promotes local artists, both established and emerging, through innovative programmes and highlights the best of the best in contemporary visual arts its and various mediums.
The first edition of CAB, “Imagining Peace”, was launched to encourage peace between and within nations, communities, families and individuals. It was not so much about showcasing Sri Lankan art; but a project with a vision. The aim was to
show the world that despite the fact that Sri Lanka being a seemingly politically, ethnically polarized society, artists can work together as collectives. A sign of peace in itself.
With the second edition of CAB 2012, ‘Becoming’ provided an international platform. The Directors wished to showcase the very best of Sri Lankan contemporary visual artists alongside regional and international artists. Curators were appointed
from Austria and India to provide an outside eye for the selection of Sri Lankan artists and contextualise their works alongside artists from across the world.
CAB 2012, continued to provide a platform for the important role that artists have in society, reflecting and exploring its contemporary concerns. The theme ‘Becoming’ was selected as a natural follow on from the theme of ‘Imagining Peace’
and it acknowledged a point of time in the country’s history. ''Becoming'' is neither about the past nor the future, it is about the creative potentiality of the ever moving and changing present. In addition to the exhibitions, CAB explored the theme through
a varied and well attended programme of seminars and workshops.
The CAB mission will continue to be honoured into the future. Extremely positive outcomes have already been manifested as a result of its mission and this has been seen in the form of; international residencies, Sri Lankan artists being showcased
internationally and even a Sri Lankan artist being selected as the winner of the Hong Kong based Sovereign Asian Art Prize 2010.
The CAB Directors are fully committed in their continued mission to create platforms and expose the excellence of Sri Lankan Contemporary art.
'MAKING HISTORY' will be the new theme for 2014 and is a provocation exploring the artistic adventure of making history. It enquires into the contemporary aesthetic experience, from historical, present and future points of view, to reveal
a possible reality of making history as part of an art historical trajectory.
Anoli Perera says “History is inescapable. As human beings, our bodies are inscribed with connotations that in many ways defy temporality, and in our modernity, refers to parallel representations of cultures,
events, moments and emotions. Our bodies are historically marked, while emotionally ‘present’ with a desire to invent the future.
Do we make history or does history makes us what we are today? This is a question often asked, and an answer to this could take us on a deep and nuanced exploration of the implications of history on the human being as well as the human
condition.”
Artists for CAB 2014 include several of Sri Lanka’s most recognized and emerging artists, as well as artists from England, USA, Qatar, Austria, Scotland, France, Sweden, Iran, Japan, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Nepal.
