A colourful collection of stark vibrancy is currently on at the Barefoot Gallery. When I dropped in this week I found each of the paintings to be full of colour and life, and certainly ooze the feel-good factor.

That said, you would walk out a far more cheerful than you walked in to the acrylic-on-canvas exhibition.

Each of the paintings, based on a variety of subjects had bright, deep colours that steal your attention. While it makes you wonder how the artist fit in such contrasting colours within a frame, you also realize a lot of effort and thought and time went into each of them.

The man behind there’s paintings has a personality to complement the vibrancy, and is a feel-good conversationalist himself! Mika Harridge currently resides in Yorkshire, England and this is his debut exhibition in Sri Lanka.

With a few days left in the course of the exhibition run from 6^th to 22^nd December, most paintings are already sold out. Alumnus of St. Peter’s College, Colombo he follwed Art Classes at the Jacob Kramer College of Art from 1975 to 1977.

His Tutor was Pam Rex to whom he believes he owes his artistic perception.

Speaking on his work and inspiration he said, “I do not select and work on a particular theme. I go all over the place, flowers, plants landscapes, horticulture. I have always painted – painted everything under the sun – from landscapes to abstracts.”

A witty and endearingly eccentric human being, he enthused, “I am inspired and influenced by anything I have seen, mostly from what I have seen while travelling. I love to travel.

Not merely to travel but to see what I see while travelling. I know people who travel on business on a weekly basis, but have no time or interest to look around them! I find it very strange!!”

He added, “As with themes, I don’t favour a particular colour either. I’ll paint yellow today, purple tomorrow, and turquoise the day after. Life is too short to get stuck on the same page, and there’s too much out there to have a predominant preference for one thing.

I try out as much as possible and try not to pigeon hole things. I love and waver, I love to waver”

Speaking on the creative process he said, “I don’t have an end result in mind when I start painting. I am extremely particular about proportions and ratios.

Most of all bouncing colours and vibrance. I can never take black and white movies, neither can I understand why modern day photographers would have their work done in grayscale! Even when I see old photographs I visualize them in colour.

After all colour is a matter of perception, and is a mix of hue, saturation and light.”

By Nivedha Jeyaseelan

Photos by Samantha Perera

A colourful collection of stark vibrancy is currently on at the Barefoot Gallery. When I dropped in this week I found each of the paintings to be full of colour and life, and certainly ooze the feel-good factor.

That said, you would walk out a far more cheerful than you walked in to the acrylic-on-canvas exhibition.

Each of the paintings, based on a variety of subjects had bright, deep colours that steal your attention. While it makes you wonder how the artist fit in such contrasting colours within a frame, you also realize a lot of effort and thought and time went into each of them.

The man behind there’s paintings has a personality to complement the vibrancy, and is a feel-good conversationalist himself! Mika Harridge currently resides in Yorkshire, England and this is his debut exhibition in Sri Lanka.

With a few days left in the course of the exhibition run from 6^th to 22^nd December, most paintings are already sold out. Alumnus of St. Peter’s College, Colombo he follwed Art Classes at the Jacob Kramer College of Art from 1975 to 1977.

His Tutor was Pam Rex to whom he believes he owes his artistic perception.

Speaking on his work and inspiration he said, “I do not select and work on a particular theme. I go all over the place, flowers, plants landscapes, horticulture. I have always painted – painted everything under the sun – from landscapes to abstracts.”

A witty and endearingly eccentric human being, he enthused, “I am inspired and influenced by anything I have seen, mostly from what I have seen while travelling. I love to travel.

Not merely to travel but to see what I see while travelling. I know people who travel on business on a weekly basis, but have no time or interest to look around them! I find it very strange!!”

He added, “As with themes, I don’t favour a particular colour either. I’ll paint yellow today, purple tomorrow, and turquoise the day after. Life is too short to get stuck on the same page, and there’s too much out there to have a predominant preference for one thing.

I try out as much as possible and try not to pigeon hole things. I love and waver, I love to waver”

Speaking on the creative process he said, “I don’t have an end result in mind when I start painting. I am extremely particular about proportions and ratios.

Most of all bouncing colours and vibrance. I can never take black and white movies, neither can I understand why modern day photographers would have their work done in grayscale! Even when I see old photographs I visualize them in colour.

After all colour is a matter of perception, and is a mix of hue, saturation and light.”

By Nivedha Jeyaseelan

Photos by Samantha Perera