Chathuri Nissansala

Chathuri Nissansala (b. 1993, Colombo) is a multidisciplinary Sri Lankan artist whose practice spans performance, installation, sculpture, drawing, and textile-based processes. Their work engages with intergenerational memory, gendered identities, ritual economies, and the politics of the body, often reconfiguring found objects, damaged devotional material, vernacular textiles, and riot-control remnants into performative assemblages. Through these material gestures Nissansala examines how rituals, national mythologies, and craft knowledge shape lived experiences in Sri Lanka.

Nissansala received her BFA in Painting from Chitra Kala Parishath, Bengaluru (2017) and an MVA in Painting from the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda (2019). Nissansala was awarded the Commonwealth Scholarship (ICCR – South East Asia) to pursue their higher studies in India. Their interdisciplinary approach is informed by research methodologies that draw from anthropology, textile studies, and embodied practice. Nissansala has been nominated for The Emerging Artist Award (2022-23) by The Arts Family, London. In 2023 Nissansala was a recipient of the Prince Claus Seed Award (by the Prince Claus Fund, NL).

A key part of their work involves long-term field and archival research. Nissansala is the co-founder of KAGUL, a collective dedicated to documenting and revitalising southern Sri Lanka’s ritual textile traditions while fostering networks among marginalised craftspeople. Their collaborative and community-driven work extends into workshops, site-responsive performances, and curatorial initiatives across the region.

Nissansala has performed and exhibited across Asia, some of these including a solo exhibition ‘Ritualizing the disfigured: Memorials of healing from Sri Lanka’ by Anant art gallery (2021); solo exhibition ‘Ritualizing Mutant encounters’ at Barefoot Gallery Colombo (2024); ‘This land is not mine, mother!’, curated by Natasha Ginwala at the SNAFU building part of Colomboscope edition; performed at the 2024 ‘Way of the Forest’, curated by Natasha Ginwala, Hitmang Gurang, Sarker Protik, Sheelasha Rajbandria; ‘The Order of Nature’, project by Geoffrey Bawa Trust on hidden queer histories, architecture and landscape of Lunuganga gardens designed by architect Geoffrey Bawa a research and installations were created by Thilini Perera, Shenuka Correa and Chathuri Nissansala; performance lecture at T works (trans disciplinary performance company) 2024 open academy edition at Singapore; performed at the Prince Claus Symposium ‘Legacies of Care, Failures and Emerging Solidarities’ at the Lunuganga Gardens in Sri Lanka.

Group exhibitions include ‘Crafting the Cross Roads’, curated by Somedutta Malik at Dhi art space Hyderabad (2022); ‘queernocopia’, curated by Myna Mukherjee under engendered platform Delhi, NFT, and physical group show (2022); ‘Momentum of smell’, initiated by Mullegama Art center, Sovereign Asian Art Foundation (2022); ‘Rehang’, curated by Uthra Rajgopal and Anant art, Bikaner House, Delhi (2021); ‘Responses to Memory’, curated by Oorja Garg at Gillehri Arts initiative (2020); 15th Virtual Concert: Celebrating Women’s Month in South Africa, curated by Bernadette Muthien (2020); Umnyama 2020, curated by Pranamita Borgohain and organised by Young Hearts, India (2020); Lock Unlock: Edition 9 organised by Dagmar Glaustnitzer Smith (2020); Webinars organised by Hexxyduxxybox performance art collective including The Action Poetry, curated by Frank Bready Trejo (2020); Be-coming Tree, curated by Jatun Risba, O.Pen, Danielle Imara, and Chris Grady (2020) (online) and Performance Art Project: Asia in collaboration with Rah Residency, Iran (2020). Nissansala also participated in the Student’s Biennale, Kochi Muziris Biennale, India (2016).

Nissansala has participated in various workshops and residences including ‘All right Angles’ residency by Colomboscope and Geoffrey Bawa Trust ( 2023); ‘Kal’, a collaboration between a district school in Berlin, Archive books, Goethe institute Karachi and Colombo (2021), ‘Kal’ extension exhibited at 12 gates Philadelphia; ‘Naam’ was a project collaborated with ‘WE ARE FROM HERE’ collective generating conversation on preserving heritage sites and current political situation of displacement, a series of online discussions Chronicles of Confinement, organised by Hector Canonge, New York (2020); Artsathone, organised by British Council, Colombo, Sri Lanka (2019) and Body workshop, facilitated by Nikhil Chopra and Madhavi Ghore, organized by HH Artspace in collaboration with Asia Art Archive and Serendipity Art Foundation, Vadodara (2017).