THAMOTHARAMPILLAI SHANAATHANAN

Thamotharampillai Shanaathanan (b. 1969, Jaffna,  lives and works in Jaffna) explores themes of loss, memory, home, and identity, often addressing the complex issues related to Sri Lanka’s civil war in his art practice. The artist’s work is deeply informed by research, documentation, and oral history, centring on the lived experiences of individuals affected by displacement. 

Shanaathanan holds a PhD in Art History from Jawaharlal Nehru University, Delhi (2011), and both an MFA (2000) and a BFA (1997) in Painting from the College of Art, Delhi. He currently serves as a Professor of Art History in the Department of Fine Arts at Jaffna University. He is also a co-founder of the Sri Lankan Archive for Contemporary Art, Architecture, and Design, Jaffna, and funder of ‘Kolam’ craft initiative.  His works have been exhibited widely in Sri Lanka and at the Museum of Anthropology at UBC, Vancouver (2010); Queensland Art Gallery, South Brisbane (2010); Museum of Ethnology ( 2008-9), Vienna; Devi Art Foundation, New Delhi (2009), Asian Art Archive, Hong Kong (2016), Kochi Art Biennial (2016), Museum of Modern Art, New York (2016), Lahore Biennial (2017) , Dhaka Art Summit (2018), Sharjah  Art Biennial (2019), MMCA, Colombo ( 2020,2024) among others. 

His artist book projects include ‘The One Year Drawing  Project’(2008),‘The Incomplete Thombu’ (2011) and A-Z of conflict (2019), commissioned and published by Raking Leaves, London. He is also the author of several articles and book chapters on Modern and Contemporary visual art in Sri Lanka. His books in Tamil include ‘Tagore’s Visit to Jaffna: Art , identity and Discourse’, ‘Modernity and Visual Art in Jaffna: 1920-1990’ and ‘Western Modernism:Painting, Sculpture and Architecture’. ‘Murals in Jaffna’ is his forth coming book.

He has received several prestigious awards, including the Bunka Award from the Japan Foundation (2015) and the title of Kalasuri from the Government of Sri Lanka (2007). Shanaathanan has also completed residencies at the Museum of Anthropology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver (2009), and the Usher Gallery, Lincoln, UK (2004).