Ben Uri Research Unit

Born: 1966 Colombo, Sri Lanka

Year of Migration to the UK: 1975

Other name/s: Chud Clowes

Biography

Mixed-media artist Chudamani Clowes was born in Colombo, Sri Lanka in 1966 where her father and cousins owned tea plantations. Clowes cites her most significant childhood memory as sitting among her family's tea fields, while playing with an elephant skull. This early engagement with the natural world continues to manifest in her artistic practice. Aged eight, in 1975, she immigrated to London with her family. Initially intending to pursue a career in biology, Clowes worked as a teacher for two decades before she pursued her passion for fine art and began a course at Central Saint Martin’s College of Art and Design in London. Under the tutelage of noted artists, Sonia Boyce and Faisal Abdu’Allah, she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in 2008, followed by a Master’s degree from the Royal College of Art, London (RCA). She also holds a Post Graduate Certificate of Education from the University of London.

Clowes’s practice encompasses a diverse range of media, and she is known for her incorporation of unconventional materials, such as elephant dung paper and banana paper, alongside the more conventional. Clowes’ work explores human narratives, often featuring fictional characters she creates to reinterpret history and examine themes of migration and race. She identifies natural elements, such as coral, alongside archival material relating to Sri Lankan and British cultures, as key influences. Her practice involves reimagining artefacts from her family’s colonial history, employing printmaking and ceramic techniques to construct a personal narrative of possible past events. Another common feature is the portrayal of non-Europeans within museum contexts. Clowes also draws inspiration from large-scale Victorian artworks, such as Ford Maddox Brown’s seminal painting, The Last of England and she has also reinterpreted the numerous figures depicted in William Frith’s The Day at the Races. Through varied techniques, spanning relief printing, etching, and ceramic work, she fabricates a cast of imagined characters. A central theme is an exploration of post-colonial narratives, with a specific focus on how contemporary art engages with the ethnographic collections of institutions, such as the British Museum. This interest is rooted in a connection she forged between a personal childhood recollection and the historical spectacle of elephants being transported from Ceylon (present-day Sri Lanka) to London for performances during the era of the British Empire.

Clowes has participated in several exhibitions dealing with themes of migration and diaspora. In 2014, she was awarded the Griffin Art Prize, culminating in a solo show titled White City at the Griffin Gallery in west London, the result of a six-month residency (2015). The exhibition explored themes of immigration, race and diaspora. The title was inspired by the location of the gallery (close to White City) and is named after the white buildings of the 1908 Franco-British Exhibition. Clowes’ research uncovered a personal link to the exhibition through photographs of Ceylonese elephant troops, highlighting her ancestral connection. The exhibition also confronted the contemporary refugee crisis in the Mediterranean. Through vibrant colours and shimmering materials, Clowes’ Jellyheads and Tentacle series depicted the perilous journeys undertaken by those fleeing conflict. A central gold tent made from survival blankets and jellyfish costumes further underscored the gravity of the situation. In summer 2016, she presented gold and black paintings exploring migratory bird patterns at the Centre for Languages, Culture & Communication at Imperial College London. Her exhibition Sub-marine, held at Saskia Fernando Gallery in 2018-19, continued with the theme of migration, explored through the lens of her colonial past. Inspired by a childhood memory and historical events, she utilised painting, collage, and printmaking, to compare coral migration with human journeys across oceans, driven by factors including conflict and environmental issues. Clowes examined the perilous nature of migration, highlighting the absence of borders beneath the water's surface, rendering visible topics usually deemed invisible. The ocean became a metaphor for migration. In 2022, she took part in Homeground, a group exhibition at Karachi’s ArtChowk Gallery, which focussed on themes of diaspora and migration as experienced by women of colour from Pakistan, Sri Lanka, and India. Clowes’s work drew parallels between coral reefs and her family history, using a family aerogramme as inspiration. Her mural, The Unexpected Letter, replicated the aerogramme’s physicality, immersing viewers in her memories. In paintings such as Surprise, Clowes’s vibrant use of colour and texture created a mesmerising effect.

Chudamani Clowes lives in Wimbledon, south London. Her work is not currently held in any UK public collections. Clowes is represented in Sri Lanka by Saskia Fernando Gallery.

Related organisations

Central St Martins School of Art (student)
Royal College of Art (student)
University of London (student )

Selected exhibitions

Wild Parlour: An artists philosophy collective presents Alternative Airport (group show), RuptureXIBIT +Studio, Hampton Wick (2023)
Neulinge Presents: Figure it out (group show), Lewisham Arthouse, London (2020)
Sub-Marine (solo exhibition), Saskia Fernando Gallery, Colombo (2018-19)
Woolwich Contemporary Print Fair (group show), Woolwich Works/The Fireworks Factory, London (2017)
Looking at People Looking at Art (group show), Division of Labour, London (2016)
Murmurations (solo show), Centre for Languages, Culture & Communication, Imperial College London (2016)
White City (solo exhibition), Griffin Gallery, London (2015)
West Wednesday (group show), Griffin Gallery, London (2015)

Ben Uri archive

Consult items in the Ben Uri archive related to [Chudamani Clowes]

Ben Uri Research Unit

for the study and digital recording of the Jewish, Refugee and wide Immigrant contribution to British visual culture since 1900.

Chudamani Clowes artist