Welcome to Hard Talk on the BBC World Service with me, Zainab Badawi. I'm just outside Colombo, the capital of Sri Lanka.

This beautiful island nation has been plunged into its worst economic crisis for more than 70 years.

It led to widespread protests last year and the resignation of the president. And all this after a long-running civil war in which up to

a hundred thousand died. My guest is one of Sri Lanka's most influential and pioneering artists

and activists, Jagat Vera Singer. His work addresses some of the country's most difficult issues,

including the brutality of its past. What now for Sri Lanka can it forge an

identity and future around which everyone can unite? Jagat Vera Singer, welcome to Hard Talk.

I'm happy to be here. Sitting here in your home, which is also your studio, I wonder how far you've

been influenced as both an artist and an archaeologist by Sri Lanka's past.

I'm totally influenced by that.

I'm totally, yes.

Everything I do has something to do with the past of Sri Lanka and the idea of the past.

But it's not just Sri Lanka's past, it's a particularly bloody past that you choose to focus on.

Yeah, that is what I call the history of the present. You know, we have a long history

coming from like fifth century, BC like, and you know, there's this great history of Sri Lanka

or South Asia. But the 20th century history, as I call the history of the present,

which defines myself and my art and my thinking.

Lalit Manage, who is co-director of an arts collective, which you helped co-found,

says you cannot talk about various singers' work without talking about the history of the land.

But can you only create your best art through that terrible lived experience?

What about using the power of the imagination to create positive works of art?

I'm a Buddhist, Sri Lankan, born and bred here,

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