Anoli Perera is a visual artist and writer. Her studies in Political Science, Economics and Sociology at the University of Colombo in Sri Lanka in the early 1980s were followed by a postgraduate diploma in International Affairs from the Bandaranaike Center for International Studies, Sri Lanka. Her art education came through part time adult education art programs at City College, Santa Barbara and Artworks, Princeton, USA.
Her work engages critically on thematics that range from women’s issues, history and myth to issues of identity, colonialism and post-colonial anxieties. Her works have been exhibited in Colomboscope, Colombo, Sri Lanka, 2019; 4th Edition of Kochi Muziris Biennale, Kochi, India, 2018; Colombo Art Biennale, 2009, 2012 & 2014; ‘Artful Resistance’ Museum of Anthropology, Vienna, Austria, 2009 and Museum der Weltkulturen, Frankfurt, Germany, 2010; ‘Separating Myth from Reality’ (Art Festival), Fukuoka Asian Art Triennale, Japan, 2002 amongst others. Her work was included in the exhibition, ‘Greetings from India’ organized as part of 5th Edition of Jimei x Arles International Photo Festival in November 2019 in China. She was invited to show at the launching exhibition of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, Sri Lanka, ‘One Hundred Thousand Small Tales’, 2019.
Her writings on contemporary Sri Lankan art has been published in a number of publications including Art Asia Pacific (Australia), South Asia Journal for Culture (SriLanka), Frontline (India), Asian Art Archive (Hong Kong), Society and Culture in South Asia (India) and numerous art catalogues and books on Sri Lankan art. Her book, H. A. Karunaratne published in 2019 documents the art practice of a master artist in Sri Lanka.
Anoli Perera is a co-founder of the Theertha International Artists Collective, a progressive art initiative based in Colombo. She currently lives and works alternatively in New Delhi, India and Colombo, Sri Lanka.