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Refreshing glimpses While at the
University of Kelaniya, Mahinda along with his colleagues, held
two art exhibitions titled 'Mihisara Pahasara'. 'Sisila' is his
first solo effort. About 30 water colours will be on display. The exhibition opens on January 9 at 6.00 p.m. and will be held until January 13 from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. at the Alliance Francaise in Colombo. For
the love of Audrey Almost ten
years after her death in 1993, Audrey Hepburn's two sons are at
loggerheads with the Swiss village of Tolochenaz, where the actress
and UNICEF ambassador made her home and final resting place. Sean Ferrer
and Luca Dotti are demanding that the villagers return personal
items they say they lent to the museum they helped set up as a memorial
to their mother's remarkable life and career. But the residents
of Tolochenaz - perched in the hills overlooking Lake Geneva, 20
miles from Lausanne - argue that the museum will be forced to close
without them. It was a very
different story in 1996, when a happy Sean Ferrer was in Tolochenaz
to open the Audrey Hepburn Pavilion. "There were various ideas,
like changing the name of the main road through the village to Audrey
Hepburn Avenue," said Ferrer, Hepburn's son from her first
marriage to actor Mel Ferrer. "But I said, 'Absolutely not!'
My mother loved the privacy of the village and would not have wanted
that. "Then the mayor said that a little building, previously
used as a school overflow, had been empty for a few years and we
came up with the idea to enrich the area with exhibitions of paintings
and sculpture. Then came the idea about how to launch the concept
of this Pavilion - an exhibition of Audrey's youth, her career,
and work with UNICEF." Sean and Luca
(Hepburn's son with second husband, Italian psychiatrist Andrea
Dotti) donated family photographs, film posters and memorabilia,
including their mother's Oscar for Roman Holiday, to fill the pavilion.
Now, however, they claim that the exhibition was never intended
to be permanent and the items were only on loan, adding that they
are concerned that the pavilion has become commercialised in a manner
that would have distressed their mother. The dispute
would have annoyed and embarrassed Audrey Hepburn, who valued her
peace and tranquility. Indeed, the 18th century farmhouse where
she spent the final 30 years of her life is called La Paisible (the
peaceful place). Hepburn hated
conflict of all kinds. Born Edda Hepburn-van Heemstra in 1929 in
Belgium, the only child of a Dutch baroness and a British father
with a dash of Irish in his ancestry, she was only six when her
parents parted. Four years later, she was home for the holidays
at the family's fabled castle at Doorn, near Arnhem, when World
War II broke out. Her mother
decided not to send her ten-year-old daughter away because she thought
Holland would remain neutral. Sadly, the day after Edda's 11th birthday,
the Germans walked into Arnhem, turning the city into a fortress
in which food and medicine were scarce. Edda, the product
of a sheltered childhood of servants, nannies and private tutors,
became a message-carrier for the Resistance and once spent a month
in a cellar hiding from the Nazis. An adored uncle was arrested
and shot with other hostages. And a cousin was rounded up and killed.
More than once Edda had to use her embryonic acting talent to get
herself out of a tight corner. Who could suspect such an innocent
looking waif of carrying coded communications in her school bag? The cold, the
hunger, and the sheer terror of those years left a permanent mark
on Edda. Her dreams of becoming a prima ballerina ended when she
was advised that malnutrition had left her body too weak and fragile.
For the rest of her life, she disliked her famously slender body,
always struggling to keep on weight. "I'm not
beautiful," she once said with characteristic modesty. "My
mother called me an ugly duckling. I've big feet and such a big
nose. I'm too thin and have no bosom to speak of. I probably hold
the distinction of being one movie star who, by all the laws of
logic, should never have made it." But make it
she did. She moved to England and won a role in the 1948 musical,
High Button Shoes. She was soon winning small film roles before
being spotted on the beach by the famous novelist and screenwriter
Colette, who insisted that she take the title role in Gigi, her
new Broadway play. It was while she was working on Broadway that
director William Wyler spotted her and asked her to screen test
for his movie Roman Holiday opposite Gregory Peck. So began the
career that would make Audrey Hepburn one of the most adored actresses
in the world, starring in movies such as My Fair Lady, Sabrina,
Funny Face, Breakfast at Tiffany's, and The Nun's Story. Yet Hepburn
herself always insisted that her dream was to start a family and
in 1965 she retired from her active film career to concentrate on
Sean. "For me
there's nothing more pleasant or exciting or lovely or rewarding
than seeing my children grow up... and they only grow up once, remember,"
she explained. "It would be terribly sad, wouldn't it, to look
back on your life in films and not to have known your children?" Her love and
compassion for children made her the ideal ambassador for the United
Nations Children's Education Fund, and ultimately she found this
role her most satisfying. Sadly, it was during a UN trip to Somalia
in 1991 that it became clear she was unwell. In unguarded moments,
she was seen clutching her stomach: her pain was a symptom of cancer
of the colon. After surgery
at the end of 1992, doctors told her they had successfully removed
a colon tumour and that the cancer had been contained. But she failed
to rally and a month later, her old friend Gregory Peck helped her
to fly back to her beloved Swiss home. It was at La Paisible, with
her partner Robert Wolders at her bedside, that she died on 20 January,
1993. As a woman of dignity who guarded her privacy and shied from
the limelight, Audrey Hepburn would no doubt disapprove of the bitter
and very public battle over her memory. Ferrer, too, is keen to
defuse the dispute and restore calm to Tolochenaz. "She loved the town the way it was," he said from his Los Angeles home. "She wouldn't want to change something that has been that way for hundreds of years or to Hollywoodize it in any way." Products
of silence Prasanna's
oil paintings also incorporating jute and bamboo on canvas, reflect
a great deal of creativity and innovation. Having attended only
a handful of art classes in his life, Prasanna has essentially adopted
his own style of drawing. Inspired mainly
by nature, Prasanna's work brings out tastefully blended bursts
of colour.As a toddler of 3 or 4, whenever he couldn't fall asleep
he was in the habit of jumping out of bed and making scribbles on
pieces of paper said his mother, Mrs. D.A.M. Perera. The youngest
of four children, Prasanna was and still is the most independent
of the lot, she says. As a youngster
he won third place in the all-island deaf school art competition
and subsequently was placed first in the Escolympics art category
(under 12). Despite having had quite a few years of work experience
in commercial art at De Alwis Advertising, Amerasian International
and Graffiti Productions and since studying architecture under a
Chartered Architect, Prasanna opted to pursue a career in art.From
painting, to framing and packing, he does it all says Mrs. Perera.
He stays up all night painting and making frames for his paintings.
He wants to make it on his own, without anybody's help and he has,
she added proudly. Prasanna puts a turpentine base on each of his
paintings to make them more durable and waterproof. They'd last
a 100 years, he signs confidently. His main income
comes from selling his paintings to tourists at hotels. Once he has
a number of paintings he goes out to various hotels and sells them
to their guests. He has sold
his paintings to tourists from all parts of the world. Many have
shown keen interest in his work; one even went back to Germany and
sent him a complete set of paints, brushes etc. in order to encourage
him. A vibrant personality Presanna communicates with each potential buyer, regardless of whether they buy his work or not. Those who meet him cannot but be awed, not just by his talent but by his ability to make the best of his situation. Kala Korner 'Arumosam Vehi'
has a straightforward plot revolving round a circus, which comes
to the village. Naturally the village is all excited and the circus
clown (Mahendra Perera) soon finds a big following among the children.
The tough circus manager who is plotting to oust the owner, (W Jayasiri),
wants to fix the clown whom he considers a confidante of the owner.
The children play a decisive role in upsetting the manager's plot. Colombage had
made a random selection of boys to act in the film. Picked from
Maliyadeva College, Kurunegala, they do their roles quite admirably.
Vasantha Vittachchi playing a cameo role of the 'Veda Hamuduruwo',
deserves special mention. Rather unusual Eisha's maiden
effort in fiction was 'Pancha', a sensitive portrayal of the innocent
charm of young people. She goes back to her childhood days relating
the endearing story of 'Rosy'. This children's book has been illustrated
by renowned artist Sybil Wettasinghe. 'Martha Nanda' is a one-act
play written by Eisha and is a farce delving into the mind of an
unmarried woman dreaming of marriage. Apart from
these, Eisha has also published a study on the works of the celebrated
French novelist Gustave Flaubert, author of 'Madame Bovary'. The
publication has been done in both English and French. Eisha's interest
in theatre and literature obviously stems from her home environment.
Her father, R D K Jayawardena, while serving in the administrative
service, showed a keen interest in drama in the late fifties and
the sixties. Glossary
of artistes The book also
records valuable information relating to Sinhala theatre which would
be of immense use to any student of drama. These include the recipients
of awards at the State Drama Festivals from 1959 up to 1999 (that's
the year up to which information has been gathered), award winners
at Youth Drama (NYSC) Festivals from 1978 onwards, locations of
theatre halls district-wise, cinema halls, cultural centres, media
contacts, publications and many more. I found the list of dramas stretching from 1943 onwards most interesting. The editor also devotes a page to pay tribute to dramatists of yesteryear who are no more. |
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Copyright © 2001 Wijeya Newspapers
Ltd. All rights reserved. |
Born in
1977 in Ragama, Mahinda Kumara received his primary education from
Batuwatta Primary School, later joining Gampaha Bandaranayake College.
He went on to receive a Bachelor of Arts Degree from the University
of Kelaniya.
Prasanna
Perera (33) is hearing impaired and has been so from the age of
one year and 10 months. Currently making a living as an artist,
this father of one is blessed with determination and perseverance.
