Although the Ceylon Society of Arts was actively engaged in the implementation if its grand vision in these immediate post-independence years, it gradually lost its dynamism and stamina and degenerated into a sterile official organization.  Its attitude to painting, represented by the painter Gate-Mudaliyar A. C. G. S. Amarasekara, (1883 – 1983) and his followers, was conservative and academic, oblivious of and even hostile to the modern stream of art and artistic thinking.

Amarasekar’s most successful painting, The Devil Dancer’s Daughter (Plate 2) is characteristic of his academic style, with each detail meticulously painted.  His early water colour landscapes are distinguished by a straight forward observation of nature and dexterous handling of transparent water colour.  Their naturalism appeals but they lack the poetry of feeling.  Amarasekara had a vast output as a portraitist, but much of his work is mediocre.  Immersed in the ideals of academic art, he pursued its principles dogmatically; consequently, his style degenerated into a banal and weak, photographic realism, with it love of polished detail.