Suchitra Mattai

Biography

Interested in domestic iconography and the historic role of fibre-based processes, Suchitra Mattai creates mixed-media work that explores the complex relationship between history, memory and the construction of identity in diasporic communities. She focuses on how natural environments shape personal narratives, ancestral histories and the creation of ‘home’.

Mattai’s work has been shown in a number of solo exhibitions, including Sweet Asylum, grayDUCK Gallery, Austin, US and K Contemporary, Denver (both 2018) and Sugar Bound, Center for the Visual Arts, Metropolitan State University of Denver (2018). She recently completed commissions for the Museum of Contemporary Art, Denver (2018) and Denver Art Museum (2017). Among her recent group exhibitions are RedLine 10X, RedLine Contemporary Art Center, Denver (2018); Art ∩ Math (Art intersect Math), Center on Contemporary Art, Seattle (2018); Liminal Space, Caribbean Cultural Center African Diaspora Institute, New York (2017); The Intrepid Garden, Buell Theater, Denver Performing Arts Center (2016) and Here and There: Drawing from Colorado to Wales, Elysium Gallery, Swansea, Wales (2014). Upcoming group exhibitions include Cultural Encounters: Art of Asian Diasporas in Latin America & The Caribbean, 1945–Present, Art Museum of the Americas, Washington, DC (2019) and Narrative Fiber, Museum of Art & History, Lancaster, California (2019).

Mattai has participated in residencies at the RedLine Contemporary Art Center, Denver (2014, 2016) and received a Royal College of Art Fellowship, London (2002). She was nominated for the United States Artist Grant (2018) as well as the Louis Comfort Tiffany Biennial Award (2009).

She holds an MFA in Painting and Drawing and an MA in South Asian Art, both from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA.

Born in 1973 in Guyana, Mattai lives and works in Denver, USA.

SAF participation:
Sharjah Biennial 14 (2019)