Is it ever possible to retrace memory? How do our memories define us? Even if we don’t want to remember, are our minds still permanently imprinted? These are the questions considered by this exhibition. Without memory, humans cannot exist; we relate our memories not only with objects and people, but also with space and architecture, which can impact individual memories as much as collective memory. Through built form, such as memorials, architecture helps to preserve specific memories. Memoryscapes is designed to render visible the stories and memories behind built spaces as portrayed by a group of Sri Lankan Tamil visual artists.

These artists challenge a clear distinction between memory as something active or received by revealing the intersection between personal memories, layered memories, collective memory, and the witness of memory. Through a set of diverse works including book art, installation, drawing, murals, collage and mixed media, Memoryscapes portrays the way in which notions of architecture and space connect and effect different types of memory. This exhibition charts a narrative of built space transformed by a contemporary politics that erases, (re)shapes and (re)builds: memorises.

Artists

Thamotharampillai Shanaathanan, Jasmine Nilani, Manoharan Prashath, Hanusha Somasundharam, Samvarthanai Gunaseharam, Mahathevan Nilanthan