Firi Rahman’s body of work consists entirely of hyperrealist drawings. He held his first solo exhibition at Saskia Fernando Gallery in 2015 after which his work was featured in Colomboscope – Shadow Scenes, a visual art exhibition curated by Natasha Ginwala and Menike Van der Poorten. He was thereafter invited to speak at the Sri Lankan Archive for Contemporary Art, Architecture and Design in Jaffna on his work and experiences as an emerging artist.
In this body of work Rahman has evolved from portraiture to conceptual hyperrealism. After completing research on the subject of extinction accompanied by his own advocacy against the increase in endangered species in Sri Lanka alone, he began work on drawings of animals that depict their story within markings and the illustration itself. Moving away from direct representation into a narrative of purpose the artist combines the story with the movement and character of his subject, using detail to create a seemingly tactile creature.