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Hashan Cooray approaches space not as a fixed container but as an entity produced through continuous encounter. The artist’s process mirrors an act of dissection. Drawing from biological studies and the artist’s practice of drying and separating flowers, Cooray breaks apart structures in order to decipher them.
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In the series, Where Depth Begins, paper faces are slightly raised and suspended from the surface of the canvas. Intensely gestural in its mark making, these faces hover over hazy saturated canvases that appear indistinct and atmospheric. The image no longer resides securely within the painting but also occupies a shallow space in front of it. As the viewer shifts their gaze, the shadow cast by the lifted visage makes depth a lived experience rather than a pictorial illusion.
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Divided into interlocking pieces along anatomical lines and assembled into a whole but never fully resolves into a neat finished puzzle. The portrait appears constructed rather than captured. Each segment functions as a unit of perception, and the act of seeing becomes analogous to assembling — the viewer mentally reconnects fragments while simultaneously recognising the impossibility of a complete unit.
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Nothing Casts a Shadow Alone ultimately becomes an exploration of the act of creation itself. The works propose that meaning is not embedded within the artwork nor within the viewer’s perception alone. It emerges in the space between them. As shadows require both a body and a light source, so too does interpretation require presence — a viewer willing to look and relate. In this shared encounter, the intangible is briefly given form, and flatness opens into depth.
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Nothing Casts a Shadow Alone: Hashan Cooray
Past viewing_room
