Artist

George Keyt

Sri Lanka, 1901–1993

George Keyt was a Sri Lanka Cubism Synthetic artist. 2 works are cataloged here, principally at Victoria and Albert Museum. George Keyt was born in Kandy.

George Percival Sproule Keyt, (17 April 1901 – 31 July 1993) was a Sri Lankan painter. He is often considered Sri Lanka's most distinguished modern painter. Keyt's dominant style is influenced by cubism.

He also claimed to be influenced by his contemporary Henri Matisse and the ancient Buddhist art and sculpture of Nagarjunakonda, Sanchi and Gandhara. The Jataka tales formed a recurring theme in many of his works. In addition to being a painter, Keyt was a poet.

He outlined his perceptions and practice as a painter in a few essays on the vision of the painter. One of his most notable literary works is his translation of the Gita Govinda into English (Bombay, 1940) and Sinhalese. These translations were illustrated by his own line drawings (see Martin Russell collection and Amerasinghe-Ganendra collections).

Works by George Keyt

Collections represented

Catalog records compiled from museum open-access collections; the artworks shown are in the public domain. Spotted an error in this record? Tell us.