📅 The event schedule for Travelling Plants is here! Join us from 6–26 June 2025 for a series of events across Studio Kayamai, Goethe-Institut, and Alliance Française de Colombo.
🌿 Events include:
🎬 Film screenings
🎨 Art and ecology workshops
🗣️ Artist talks and panel discussions
🌱 Interactive sessions for kids and adults
Limited-capacity workshops — email events@alliancefrancaise.lk to register
🌿Join us for a month of immersive art, workshops, discussions, screenings & performances. Experience how plants — and stories — travel across space, time, and culture.
🗓️ 6–26 June 2025
📍 Studio Kayamai, 302 Havelock Road, Colombo 5
🕚 11 AM – 7 PM (Closed Mondays)
🍃 Curated by Lina Vincent, this exhibition brings together four artists whose practices intersect deeply with the natural world, exploring the links between ecology, science, culture, and society through the lens of contemporary art.
🖼 Featuring works by:
Rashmimala (India) | Karolina Grzywnowicz (Germany) | Waylon D’Souza (India) | Wendy Therméa (Reunion Island, France)
Born from a creative residency at the French Institute of Pondicherry in March 2024, Travelling Plants is presented by Goethe-Institut, Alliance Française de Colombo, in collaboration with French Institute of Pondicherry and Studio Kayamai.
📅 10th of June — 9.30 am – 4 pm
📧 Register via email – events@alliancefrancaise.lk
📍 Venue – Alliance Française de Colombo
🎙️ Exploring the delicate balance between honouring others’ voices and our own truth in non-fiction. Join us for a day of reflection on ethical storytelling, relying on works by Nobel Prize winner Svetlana Alexievich, Sara Ahmed’s Living a Feminist Life, and insights on the “feminist ear.”
🤝 Floriane’s participation in the Sister Library supported by the French Embassy in Sri Lanka and the Maldives. The Sister Library project is funded by the Franco-German Cultural Fund. The Fund was set up in 2003 to mark the 40th anniversary of the Élysée Treaty of friendship between France and West Germany, and it promotes Franco-German cooperation by providing support for cultural and artistic projects.
📚 Image credit: Adapted from the book cover of Sarah Ahmed’s Living a Feminist Life.
🎶 On the occasion of Fête de la Musique, the French Embassy in Sri Lanka presents a celebration at Port View Restaurant, showcasing a dynamic blend of local and international musical talent.
Line-up:
🔵 Anaïs Rosso, a French singer-songwriter whose unique sound blends blues, opera, electronic, and baroque influences, performed with guitar and machines.
🔵 Tha Youngest, a Swiss-born Sri Lankan DJ delivering high-energy sets rooted in hip-hop, funk, dancehall, and a touch of reggae.
🔵 A Sri Lankan band to be announced soon!
📅 Date: Saturday, June 21st
⏰ Time: From 7:00 PM onwards
📍 Venue: Port View Restaurant, Colombo
🎟️ Free and open to all
spirit of Sri Lanka. 🙏
🗓️ Saturday, 31st May
🕥 10:30 AM – 12:30 PM
👥 For anyone aged 12 and above
📍 Alliance Française de Colombo
🎯 What to expect:
▫️ Intro to the history of Kandyan dance
▫️ Learn choreography to traditional drum rhythms
▫️ Explore body posture, precision & meaning in movement
👚 Wear comfortable leggings & a top
💧 Bring a water bottle and sport towel
Whether you’re a beginner or simply curious, come feel the rhythm, tradition, and strength of Kandyan dance.
📩 Register now via events@alliancefrancaise.lk – spots are limited!
🎹✨ Vignettes of Languedoc – An evocative audiovisual concert by Seneka Abeyratne, presented by the Alliance Française de Colombo.
Join us on a journey through the Languedoc-Roussillon region in the South of France, brought to life through 180 stunning photographs and an improvised piano performance inspired by the impressionistic styles of Debussy and Ravel.
Seneka Abeyratne — novelist, playwright, photographer, digital artist, musician, and award-winning writer — blends music and visuals in this one-of-a-kind solo performance. His photographic work, influenced by Monet and Delaunay, captures a rich tapestry of landscapes, architecture, flora, people, and abstract forms.
🗓️ Friday, 30th May 2025
🕖 7:00 PM
📍 Alliance Française de Colombo, 11 Barnes Place
🎟️ Free registration: events@alliancefrancaise.lk
Discover the artistic soul of southern France through this compelling fusion of image and sound. 🎶📷
Come through for an evening of poetry and good company!
📅 Sunday, 4 May
🕡 6.30 PM
📚 Lakmahal Community Library
🎟️ Free and open to everyone.
📝 We’ll be wrapping up a day-long writing workshop with an open-mic featuring work by our participants. Expect fresh poems, bold voices, and playful experiments! The open-mic will also feature a special performance by our facilitator, Tashyana Handy.
🌟 This isn’t a polished stage, it’s a space for sharing, listening, and connecting. Whether you know someone in the workshop or just love a good night of poetry, you’re warmly invited to join us!
🗓 Date: 4th May 2025
🕐 Time: 1:00 – 4:00 PM
📍 Location: Lakmahal Community Library
🧑🎓 Open to 15 participants aged 18 and above, writing in English.
📩 Interested poets should apply by sending a short bio and two poems to tashihandy@gmail.com before 1st May.
📖 This poetry workshop takes Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas as a sensory and ethical prompt. In the story, utopia is built through texture, colour, light, and joy—and disrupted by a single, unseen room.
📝 Through guided prompts, close reading, and group discussion, we will write from multiple perspectives: those who watch, those who stay, and those who walk away.
🧠 Participants will be invited to hold tension, name what’s difficult, and write into spaces that resist easy resolution. Through poetry, we will explore how language and the body respond to discomfort—how voice, silence, and form carry complexity both on the page and in performance.
📸 Image credit: Portrait of Tashyana Handy; background illustration adapted from the cover of Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. Le Guin (Octavo, 1969)
🧠 Facilitated by aqui Thami & Everstory
📅 Saturday, 3 May
🕥 10.00 AM – 2.00 PM
📍 Sister Library at the Lakmahal Community Library
📚 This is an invitation to gather, read, and imagine. We’ll begin with a shared reading of Sultana’s Dream, a visionary short story written in 1905 by Bengali feminist and social reformer Rokeya Sakhawat Hossain. Often described as the first feminist utopian sci-fi, it flips patriarchal norms—placing women at the center of science, governance, and social harmony.
🎨 After reading and reflecting together, we’ll move into a zine-making workshop where we explore our own visions of a feminist utopia through collage, drawing, and writing.
💭 We’ll ask ourselves:
What does my feminist utopia look like?
What would a world shaped by care, equity, and collective power feel like?
What does joy, safety, or justice look like in your dream society?
👐 Together, we’ll make small, hand-crafted zines—tiny portals into radical possibilities.
🎒 No prior experience needed. All materials provided. All genders welcome.
📩 Limited capacity. Register now by emailing: events@alliancefrancaise.lk
📸 Image credit: Portrait of aqui Thami provided by the artist; Background illustration adapted from the cover of ‘Sultana’s Dream and Padmarag’ by Rokeya Hossain (Penguin Random House, 2022)
📚Sister Library, led by Indigenous artist aqui Thami, is a vibrant art initiative that goes beyond the conventional concept of a library. Rooted in celebrating women, it intertwines literature with community involvement to nurture diverse and inclusive connections. As an evolving and generative artwork, Sister Library is a space dedicated to celebrating female creativity, housing works by women writers, artists, and zine makers. It invites in-depth reflection on our time’s visual and reading cultures, bringing readers together to explore literary contributions, highlight artistic excellence, and foster a deeper appreciation for the accomplishments of women in the creative world.
📍The project will travel to multiple locations across Sri Lanka throughout the year and be accompanied by a multifaceted programme featuring workshops, performances, talks, and readings. The Sister Library’s first stop will be the Lakmahal Community Library in Colombo, where the Sister Library will be accessible to the public during regular opening hours.
🦜Sister Library is being realized in partnership with Everystory, who have contributed a list of important Sri Lankan feminist writing to the library’s collection. Additionally, the Goethe-Institut and Alliance Française have expanded the selection by adding feminist literature from Germany and France, translated into English.
🤝🏾The project is funded by the Franco-German Cultural Fund. The Fund was set up in 2003 to mark the 40th anniversary of the Élysée Treaty of friendship between France and West Germany, and it promotes Franco-German cooperation by providing support for cultural and artistic projects. Image credit: image of Audre Lorde via Getty Images/Jack Mitchell; image of Jean Arasanayagam via The Island; image of Kumari Jayawardena via the Social Scientists’ Association of Sri Lanka; image of Uma Chakravarti via Feminism in India; image of Virginia Woolf via the Hulton Archive
