Meeting in the Sky, a unique cultural event that was a breathtaking fusion of art and nature, was hosted by Cinnamon Life in the heart of Colombo. Featuring an astonishing display of over 2000 kites, this event paid tribute to the rich and diverse wildlife of Sri Lanka, celebrating its beauty and significance through creative designs and craftsmanship.

The theme of the exhibition was an attempt to capture Sri Lanka’s iconic wildlife through art with each kite hand-crafted with care using unique and intricate patterns, vibrant colors, and majestic forms of the fauna of the island, reminding attendees of the importance of preserving its rich biodiversity. 

This exhibition was ideal for art lovers and wildlife enthusiasts alike, offering everyone a unique opportunity to explore the breathtaking exhibits while educating themselves at the same time.  

The event took place at Cinnamon Life from 11th to 14th January, allowing everyone to experience something artistic and educational. 

This extraordinary installation was a tribute to the generational crafts of Sri Lankan kite artists. Kavishka Gayashantha, a master artist, whose great-grandfather crafted the iconic Wawula kite, worked with the designer, Kumkum Fernando and his team, to bring the designs to life while modernising traditional kite artistry. 

This event provided a valuable platform for traditional kite makers to display their art, becoming more than just an inspiration, but also a place to romanticise Colombo while honouring their skills as well.

A special selection of cocktails that were inspired by the wildlife species featured in the kite exhibition, were served to guests during the event. In addition, a book showcasing the kites and the wildlife species they represented was made available during the event.

To gain deeper insights, we interviewed key figures at the event. Here are some of their perspectives.

Radiesha Daluwatte- Director of Marketing, Cinnamon Life
“Colombo is a beautiful city with many unique species of insects, snakes, and birds which inspired us to host this event and speak about these species through kites. Suppose these kites were to have a conference and come to life. It took almost a year with the help of Kumkum and the team and the family with three generations of kite makers to make this a success. The goal was to value artisanship, where tourists can make handmade kites with century-old techniques, sit with the families, learn about them, take the kites back to their countries and talk about the Colombo city.”

Kumkum Fernando- Creative designer of Meeting in the Sky
“I used to live in Colombo and I left Colombo about 17 years ago, I have a studio in Vietnam, and I’m working between Vietnam and Germany right now. I'm inspired by traditional art and I try to incorporate ancient patterns and colors into my work. Cinnamon Life being the main sponsor behind this installation, helped me a lot to make it a success. This was inspired by traditional kites of Colombo. I worked with a traditional and a talented kites crafting family from Kirulapona. A challenge I faced was that, when I designed it originally, it didn't work because they are used to working in a specific way and my designs were too intricate while they used mainly scissors, cutting papers etc. and I haven't done something similar, so originally I had to find my way around this collaboration and see how to make it work. I was the designer, and my team and I had to design this, we had to work with the kite artist to physically make this. After the design process, the designs were sent to the kite artist and they developed them flawlessly.”

Duc Luong- Illustrator
“Colombo, which is a wetland city, is filled with unique wildlife which makes it beautiful and special. This inspired Kumkum and the team to make kites based on the wild species inhabiting the land. I helped him do the full illustration of the kites. In the book, it shows the kite and the animal species it represents. It took over 6 months to do the illustrations and I'm very happy to help the local team. This whole process took almost a year for me and it was challenging as I was in Vietnam and Kumkum was in Germany so we had to mostly work online, but in the end, it's all worth it because it became a success.”

Radha Leanage- an invited guest
“Seeing the vision of this installation and how it's brought to life, the effort, thoughts, emotions, and love, that goes into creating something like this is phenomenal. The kites are all handmade and the craftsmanship which makes little sticks and pieces of coloured paper along with the little things like the sound effects and lighting shows how much work goes into making these beautiful exhibits more artistic and breathtaking.”