The seventh edition of Colomboscope: Language is Migrant, is now open to the public till 30 January 2022. This interdisciplinary arts festival brings together over 50 Sri Lankan and international artistes with events, exhibitions and performances spread over 6 venues across Colombo. Curated by Anushka Rajendran together with Artistic Director Natasha Ginwala, ‘Language is Migrant’ explores language relations with artistic and literary contributions that map hybrid belonging, diasporic lineages, and coerced dislocation. 

What Colomboscope events can you catch today and over the weekend?

 

 

21ST FRIDAY

FRIDAYS WITH CURATORS (Guided Tours): 

Happening every Friday during the festival, join curators for a walk-through of the exhibition chapters of Language is Migrant and converse around artistic processes, linguistic belonging, and collective memory. 

Location: Colombo Public Library (15, Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 07) & Rio Complex (60, Kumaran Ratnam Road, Colombo 02)

Time:  3.00 – 5.00pm 

 

THE TAMILISATION OF AHILAN RATNAMOHAN (Performance):

Ahilan Ratnamohan’s script ‘The Tamilisation of Ahilan Ratnamohan’, written collaboratively with his mother narrates his experience of learning Tamil for the first time in his life these past few years over skype conversations with his mother, communicating in their natal tongue for the very first time. This script will be performed for the first time as an intimate exploration of his diasporic identity and second-generation amnesia.

Location: Lakmahal Community Library (8A, Alfred House Road, Colombo 03)

Time:  5.00 – 6.00pm 

 

ARTISTE ENCOUNTERS & TRANSLOCAL SOLIDARITY (Conversation):

A series of dialogues among artistes and cultural organisers who are a part of Language is Migrant, elaborating on their artistic processes, material research, and more followed by a session from the platform Translocal Solidarity Networks on developing alliances between socially committed artistes and art initiatives across South Asia engaging in cultural advocacy, collaborative production, and experimental art models in the region. 

Location: Barefoot Gallery (704, Galle Road, Colombo 04) 

Time: 6.30 – 7.15pm | 7.30 – 8.15pm 

 

THE HEARING VOICES CAFÉ (Conversations, Readings, and Performances): 

Dora Garcia presents ‘The Hearing Voices Café’, a project that has manifested in different parts of the world and will be realised in Sri Lanka for the first time in collaboration with performance artiste Jayampathi Guruge alongside several guest artists and writers from different artistic forms. The Hearing Voices Café will take place daily during the course of the festival. 

Location: Lak Café, Viharamahadevi Park

Time:  4.00 -6.00pm (daily)

 

THE LOOKBOOK (Workshop): 

Fabienne Francotte invites participants to draw something unsual, building on portraiture and identity, shaping maps of spaces visited while being on the move. The Lookbook is an open diary workshop that explores drawing as a method to articulate collective experiences and emotions that compel creative expression. This workshop is available daily during the course of the festival and is recommended for ages 14 and above. 

Location: Korea Corner (2nd Floor) of the Colombo Public Library (15, Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 07)

Time: 1.30 – 4.00pm (daily)

 

22ND SATURDAY

OUR LAND, INNER LAND (Children’s Workshop): 

Artist Malki Jayakody will lead a workshop on mixed media collage inviting young participants to join her in crafting the transformations of urban landscapes and the inner and outer journeys from rural to metropolitan life. This workshop is recommended for children of 10 years and below. 

Location: Children’s Library (1st Floor) of the Colombo Public Library (15, Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 07)

Time: 10.00 – 12.00pm  

 

MIGRANT FABULATIONS (Reading and Discussion): 

Join cultural anthropologist, Omar Kasmani in hopscotch across languages, geography, and beliefs in his reading as he pursues an ethnohistorical fabulation across the personal, the political, and the sacred. 

Location: Lakmahal Community Library (8A, Alfred House Road, Colombo 03)

Time:  3.00 – 4.30pm 

 

FRAGILE INHERITANCE (Artist Tour):

A walk-through and crucial discussion with Megara Tegal and Aamina Nizar on the disappearance of Gundul (the Malay script), familial stories and the evolution of the pockets of Sri Lankan Malay communities around the island. 

Location: Rio Cinema Complex (3rd Floor) ((60, Kumaran Ratnam Road, Colombo 02)

Time: 4.00 – 5.00pm

 

THE FOREIGNER (Performance): 

The Sri Lankan iteration of Ahilan Ratnamohan’s ongoing performative series, The Foreigner, invites audiences to come and play specific games with learners of Sinhala who have no conventional performance training, and question their own assumptions related to the role of proficient language use in communication. 

Location: Rio Cinema Complex Poolside (Groundfloor) (60, Kumaran Ratnam Road, Colombo 02)

Time: 5.00 – 6.15pm 

 

ONCE REMOVED (Film Screening):

 Lawrence Abu Hamdan’s video Once Removed is a portrait of the time-traveling life and work of Bassel Abi Chahine, a 31-year-old writer, and historian who has managed to obtain the single most comprehensive inventory of extremely rare objects, photographs, and interviews with socialist militias led by Walid Jumblatt during the Lebanese Civil War. 

Location: Rio Cinema (60, Kumaran Ratnam Road, Colombo 02)

Time: 6.30 – 7.00pm

 

AARANIYAM (Performance):

A collective of four contemporary performers and dancers combining classical choreography Baratham with modern contemporary movement to poems by Packiyanathan Ahilian in collaboration with Lalindra Amarasekera, focusing on light and shadow as well as literary fields of loss and injustice. 

Location: Rio Cinema (60, Kumaran Ratnam Road, Colombo 02)

Time: 7.30 pm onwards

 

23RD SUNDAY 

OUR LAND, INNER LAND (Children’s Workshop):

Artiste Malki Jayakody will lead a workshop on mixed media collage inviting young participants to join her in crafting the transformations of urban landscapes and the inner and outer journeys from rural to metropolitan life. This workshop is recommended for children of 10 years and below. 

Location: Children’s Library (1st Floor) of the Colombo Public Library (15, Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 07)

Time: 10.00 – 12.00pm  

 

VISITOR EDUCATOR’S TOURS (Guided Tours):

Join visitor educators from the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Sri Lanka and Colomboscope volunteers for spotlight tours through the largest festival venue – the Colombo Public library, as they share their interpretation of the installations on view and the role of a public library as a space for artistic thinking. 

Location: Colombo Public Library (15, Sir Marcus Fernando Mawatha, Colombo 07) 

Time:  11.00 am – 6.00pm  

 

NEIGHBOURHOOD MOVEMENTS (Walking Tour): 

Join Phusathi Liyanaarachchi and Zul Luthufi to walk around Wellawatta as they narrate a history of labour unrest, feminist engagement through the Polytechnic, memorialising the Black July 1983 pogramme and traversing neighbourhood stories from residents’ perspectives and migratory histories. 

Meeting Point: W A Silva Museum (Silvermere, 126 W A Silva Mawatha, Colombo 06) 

Time: 10.00 – 11.00 am 

 

READING FOR LIFE BEYOND TEA (Workshop): 

Cultural anthropologist Mythri Jegathesan invites participants to think about the language, labour, and Malaiyaka Tamil estate workers that make Ceylon tea possible along with select readings from his seminal book Tea and Solidarity: Tamil Women and Work in Postwar Sri Lanka 

Location: Lakmahal Community Library (8A, Alfred House Road, Colombo 03)

Time: 11.00 – 12.00 pm 

 

KACHA KACHA (Performance):

 Kacha Kacha IX edition brings together poets, rappers, singers, remixers, VJ’s for a night of uncensored, original, trilingual expression at a working-class bar featuring Owl Tree-O, The Packet X Bo Sedkid, Anar, Tashyana Handy, GaaPiNk, and Rathya.

Location: Government Sports Bar, Colombo 08

Time: 6.00 pm onwards