- Sapumal Foundation Trustee Deborah Philip traces Lionel Wendt in Geoffrey Beling’s archives
By Shailendree Wickrama Adittiya
As part of the “Wendt on Wendt” exhibition held at the Harold Peiris Gallery from 2 to 15 November, Sapumal Foundation Trustee Deborah Philip – who is also a PhD candidate in cultural anthropology at the Graduate Centre, City University of New York – on 10 November traced the life of photographer Lionel Wendt with the use of artist Geoffrey Beling’s archives.
The discussion, presented by The Lionel Wendt Memorial Fund, looked at Wendt in fragments, using letters exchanged between Wendt and Beling, in addition to other written records, anecdotes, artworks, photographs, and other material objects.
Wendt and Beling
Philip began her engaging talk by introducing the two individuals in focus that night: “Most people know or have heard of Lionel Wendt. We are gathered here today in a building in memory of his contribution to the arts in Sri Lanka. He was a pianist, curator, photographer, art patron, and critic. Born in 1900, Wendt died unexpectedly in 1944 at the age of 44.”
She went on to say that some will know or will have heard of Geoffrey Beling, who was born in 1907 and died in 1992.
“He was an artist, an art inspector, and a Christian pastor. He trained as an architect for a few years but did not complete his studies. Both Wendt and Beling were founding members of the modernist collective, the ’43 Group, which Wendt is largely credited with facilitating.”
The founding members of the ’43 Group include George Claessen, Aubrey Collette, Justin Daraniyagala, Richard Gabriel, Manjusri, Ivan Peries, George Keyt, and Harry Pieris, the secretary of the group whose house and collection is now the Sapumal Foundation.
Philip explained that Beling and Wendt were friends before the inauguration of the ’43 Group, with Wendt being a patron of Beling’s work, as evidenced in the amount of paintings he privately owned before his death and prior to the sale of his collection in 1967.
“A lesser known fact is that Wendt and Beling were also third cousins, as their great-grandfathers were brothers.”
Fragments and archives
Explaining that her focus for the presentation largely revolved around the end of the 1920s, the early 1930s, and the newly independent Sri Lanka in the late 40s and 50s, Philip briefly described the choice of the words “fragments” and “archives” in the title. Fragment, she said, as a noun, is a small piece or a tiny brittle shard that has come off a larger whole.
“As a verb, it means to break. By titling this talk ‘Wendt in Fragments’, I want to point not just to the partial fragmentary nature of knowledge in general, but also to the ways in which an individual such as Lionel Wendt can appear in written documents, oral histories, images, sound, or, in our present context, social media, in tiny small pieces that we appropriate to construct narratives and stories that appear complete or certain.”
Despite the use of archives in the title, Philip explained that Beling did not collect documents, objects, and images with the intention of archiving Wendt or anyone else.
“In fact, if you ask his children, they will just say he never threw anything away. From that perspective, it clearly shows that those who came after him made conscious choices to store, organise, or preserve, assigning enduring value to objects in anticipation of future reuse.”
Alborado
Wendt’s house located at 18, Guildford Crescent, Colombo, known as Alborado, is now the Lionel Wendt Centre for the Arts, and the physical structure to memorialise Wendt was a key topic covered by Philip.
“With the building of the Wendt memorial hall beginning in 1948, we see the transformation of Wendt’s home from a private residence into a public space during a period of decolonisation, where newly independent nations were marking this shift in changes to the built environment.”
Philip added that this transformation from a private space to a public space was also a commentary on how the memory of Wendt is visualised as that of a space for the people.
“We are aware, however, and cannot ignore that this is not a space without its own controversies over language in the past. The staging of the first performance of Ediriweera Sarachchandra’s Maname in 1956 was seen as an attack on a place associated with the westernised bourgeois of ‘kurunduwatte’ (Cinnamon Grand).”
Philip went on to say that she thought Beling’s reflection or relationship with the building was also a reflection of his complex relationship with the field of architecture.
“Although he designed the original plans, the building of the memorial hall required qualified architects,” Philip said.
During the question and answer session that followed, Philip asked Beling’s son David Beling, who is Philip’s uncle, what his own memories were of his father’s contribution and participation in the building of the Lionel Wendt Centre for the Arts.
“I didn’t personally know Lionel Wendt. I must have been 12 months old when he died,” David Beling said, adding that with the Lionel Wendt Centre for the Arts, the plan put up by Philip during her presentation refreshed his memory of his younger days. “We were brought to the hall and my father was very happy about the system of lighting that was used to reflect natural light onto the exhibits.”
David Beling
Introducing David Beling to the audience, Philip said he is an ordained minister. He began his career in the creative world of advertising in 1964 and is a design consultant and trainer as well.
“When I asked my uncle to participate in this discussion, he said that his memory is in fragments. I said ‘that’s fine; no one is able to challenge your memory, so let’s just make up stuff as we go along’,” Philip said light-heartedly.
David Beling shared that his father had a lot of architectural involvement, and designed houses for various people. In terms of the actual painting, Beling said he had very little interaction with his father in this regard. However, he recalled the time Geoffrey Belin did some work on a baptismal background in a church in Jaffna.
“At that time, he was a Government employee entitled to warrants. He used to get his warrants and take us, kids, with him on the trip… I still have that memory,” David Beling shared.
Photos Krishan Kariyawasam