Go Home is Within Me: Pradeep Thalawatta

Go Home is Within Me is foregrounded in rebellion. Resilience and solidarity fuel the imagination. They become totems to reassess dreams. The emotionally charged atmosphere of the Aragalaya (in the aftermath of the 2022 economic collapse in Sri Lanka) catapulted a political awakening, the ripple effects of which moved through South Asia. Contained within its spontaneity was the zeal to overcome a bleak future muddled with uncertainty. Pradeep Thalawatta excavates this momentum, renewing submerged public, political, and personal aspirations through the body of work in the exhibition. 

The artist leverages an economy rich with images etched into the public imagination. Photographs of the protest that circulated across the digital space become conduits through which the artist mediates conversations on class struggles and power structures. The images emblematic of a new chapter in national history, when juxtaposed with empty plastic packaging materials, some with the price tags intact, unfold a conversation on the material, social and emotional life of people. What We Choose to Keep, Throw Away and Remember is reminiscent of a time when simpler joys that signified comfort and integral to everyday living were far more accessible.

David Hockney’s Peter Getting Out of Nick's Pool in conversation with a much-circulated image of people celebrating by the pool at the presidential residence, merges two iconic images from visual culture. While the irrecognizable faces sardonically challenge a regime that suppressed dissent, together the image pair builds on the anticipation it elicits. Swimming In The President’s Pool, hallucinates plunging back into a past replete with heightened emotions. Inspired by the energy the people’s struggle gave rise to, the artist finds an antidote against resignation in their restless dreams of alternate futures.

The uncertainties, daily negotiations, and the resilience visible within the protests on the streets share resonances with the personal and domestic sphere. Do Not Take Over Until I Imagine  unfolds as a series of erotic encounters between two people in the intimate setting of their home. Wallpapers overtake the drab walls, and a pop of colour seeps through the ordinariness. Running through the body of work is a thread common to all - a relentless zeal against all odds to carve out a life that is meaningful. 

The rebellion that characterised the protest trickles into the exhibition, subverting expectation while claiming space. I Still Locked II, 2025, a reminder of the peak of the economic recession, reinvents the gas cylinders into collection boxes for the gods. Borrowed from Jaffna’s street vernacular, the installation explores the relationship between commodities, faith and survival with satire.  Recognising creativity amidst adversity, the installation represents the imagination of the working class, liberated from the criteria of the white cube.  Challenging the tenets of fine arts, Thalawatta brings aesthetic expressions that are otherwise deemed kitsch to deliberate on social distinctions, while acknowledging the multiplicity of experiences and expressions that exist within individuals, communities, and the nation. 

Pradeep Thalawatta engages with the Aragalaya as a site where collective voices congregated in unison to charter the vision for a new political narrative. It became a space for people’s expressions, as much as their struggles. The youthful optimism he witnessed ignited the embers of hope in a belief that our stories can be rewritten and our futures reimagined.  Go Home is Within Me is part ode, part homage and part nostalgia for utopian idealism.