S6, E2 Sabes Sugunasabesan | Photographer and mixed media artist

In this episode, we meet Sabes Sugunasabesan, a photographer and mixed media artist whose work explores identity, memory, diaspora, and the emotional legacy of the Sri Lankan civil war.

Based in England and shaped by his migration from Sri Lanka over forty years ago, Sabes creates photographic and mixed‑media projects that weave personal history with wider socio‑political narratives. His practice centres on themes of belonging, trauma, land, and the emotional geographies carried across borders.

As a member of London Independent Photography and a former community development professional, Sabes brings a socially conscious, deeply human perspective to his art. This conversation delves into diasporic identity, collective memory, and the role of photography in holding space for stories that endure beyond violence and migration.

Episode recorded on 3 February, 2026. 

Instagram: @sabessuguna

Podcast details:
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Website: www.artiststales.net
Instagram: @artists_tales_podcast
Threads: @artists_tales_podcast

Transcript

In this episode of Artist Tales, I'm joined by Sabes Sugunasabesan, a photographic and mixed media artist whose work traces the intersections of identity, memory, and the Sri Lankan Pela diaspora. Having migrated to England over 40 years ago, SBA draws deeply on personal history and the emotional legacy of conflict.

Welcome service to the podcast. Thank you for having me, Heather. Well, it's great having you. So tell us a bit about yourself and, and the work that you're doing. Okay. I am, uh, Sabes Sugunasabesan and now I call myself an artist photographer if I'm to go back. Uh, I am from Sri Lanka. I was born in Malaysia. I grew up in Sri Lanka from the age of seven.

This, uh, this background is relevant to the work that I do. So, uh, uh, I grew up in Sri Lanka in the north, uh, mainly a village and, uh, then a town in Malaysia. My memories are about, uh, my father was a station master, so I, um, uh, I, I lived around railway stations, railway lines, rivers and fields, and in Sri Lanka and Malaysia.

My people were rural and town people. So that is my, my background, where I am from, and I'm ca I came to sur uh, England in 1974. There's over 50 years ever since I have lived here, and, uh, have my family and everything here now. Uh, but memories are back in Sri Lanka as well as here. It sounds like it's. You know, very much, two very different countries in many way that, that you, yes.

Where you grew up and where, you know, where you've lived since the mid seventies. That's right. Yeah. So that must be, I guess, in some ways quite dramatic. And has that influenced the type of work that you do? It does, uh, it does. Initially, when I start only here, I started doing visual, visual work.

Photography. I had a camera. Uh, I used to borrow my uncle's camera and play with it. But, uh, earnestly I only started doing photography here. Uh, before coming here, I had exposure to poetry and literature and in Sri Lanka is a very political place, so there's a lot of discussions about politics and literature.

So I had that influence as I was growing up. So coming here, this, uh, dispersal, uh, uh, migration, whatever you call it, uh, had an influence. Initially I did work around, um, missing home, the home that I left behind. Uh, so homesick kind of work I did. And, um, that was 1974. Later. Over the years from about 1983, the events that ha began happen, began to happen in Sri Lanka, was about conflict and that developed into a war.

So I was affected by that. So I was resp my work. In my work. I was responding to that in small ways, worrying about it. Um, the later I'll talk in 2009, the war ended. Since then, I have done some work, different pieces of work. They all sort of linked together. It is about war, uh, about land, about memory, uh, in that kind of theme.

So yes, uh, my, my work is, uh. In a way it is about looking at what is happening in Sri Lanka from here, from my living room, uh, because I was not there during the, during the war times. I have the, I have no direct, uh, experience or connection with it except seeing, hearing, hearing people's accounts. News and, uh, YouTube, face to face, face, Facebook messages.

Um, so that's how I, uh, inform myself about the war. Uh, and also there is a big diaspora in this country, so seeing their anxieties and anguish. So these are the sources of my work. So in a way. That, uh, what was happening in Sri Lanka has become my window of looking at, uh, other places, uh, conflict and other places.

And, uh, reflecting my response to that being from my, I am here in a comfortable place. So looking at the contrast, thinking about think, also thinking about why I worry about. People who are far away from me. So that made me think about think that, that made me think about can we be concerned about people who are not us, who are others?

So those kind of concerns, the sort of considerations came to surface to think about in my work if, um, if I can. Would it be useful if I talk about the projects that I have been doing? I was gonna ask you about the projects. Yes. So please do. Yes. Okay. So, um, my first project, uh, reflecting on the wall was called the Old to Sri Lanka.

The O Sri Lanka is, uh, was I did it in 2010. It is, uh. Metaphor, using flowers as metaphor for people in the country. Then all this, uh, as a young person influenced by visionary leaders at the time, uh, we had great hopes for the country, a united country, equal country, a socialist country, uh, that kind of visions that I grew up with.

Uh, 2010 when I did this work. It is the collapse of all those hopes. People are divided. People are, uh, isolated from one another. Communities are polarized through, through political propagandas, the [war, uh, manipulation of the politicians. So that was one work. So o to Sri Lanka, it's a book later. The war ended in 2009, so I did that in 2010 and around 2012, I did another piece of work reflecting on my experience of looking at the war from the distance.

So I did it under the theme of home thinking about what is home. What is home for me? What is home for people who are caught up in the conflict in the war? Uh, what is home for people who are, uh, running away from bombings and shellings? So I used, uh, Google Maps of the beach, Google Map, image of the beach before and after the end of the war in northern Sri Lanka.

In that image, you are seeing tents that people put up in the beach with the hope of escaping from the war and with the hope of, uh, being rescued. And they died in that beach as well. So that was, that was an installation with, within the insert, there is an image of my living room. In this big Google Map image, there is an insert of my living room.

Uh, within that there is a tv and within that is the, in, on the TV is the collage of the map where people are, uh, strand stranded. So that was that work. So that, along with that, there is a poem also, so I use photography and poem. Found images and colls and text within it as well. And later, 2016, after seven years after the end of the war, seven years after the end of the war, I went to Sri Lanka to see, in a way, to, to find out what happened, face-to-face, to be, to be there, to see the places, to talk to people.

So the, the, the trip was, uh, not a photography trip, but more of a trip for me to, uh, make connections to connect with the event that happened seven years ago and also connect with people there. So 2016 I visited, but I did some photographs. 20, 20 18. I showed it as a work called, uh, last Walk to the Beach, reflecting on the direction of the war direction of people's escape from the war to, to the beach called Mo Carl Beach earlier.

I used that on the Google map, uh, with, with a Google Map map image. So that was in 2018. And then the same year after going to Sri Lanka, I went on a tour with four other people to Southwest USA covering, uh, states like, uh, New Mexico, uta, Arizona, almost the corner of the four states. The lands that we drove through in our SUV was the Native American lands.

Mostly, uh, uh, Navajo land and, uh, that trip, it was organized as an art photography trip. That trip, as soon as I landed there, being there, I began to wonder. It started bothering me as to why I am here. It was an une and, um, I did not know by that time, I have not read much about Native Native American history.

Here I am later I read and I felt, uh, I did a project After coming back, I start, did a project reflecting on my UNE about it. So the work was about, uh, work was called Cruise America. It is about my tourism, about tourist gaze. As tourists, we go to places not knowing as to what happened in that land, what happened to the people of that land, but we go there to enjoy the landscape and take photographs and so on.

So it was a critique, critique of myself in that land. It was Cruise America, which I showed in 2022. At the time, I did a contemporary art course at City Lit. And, uh, doing that course was useful to think about, uh, photography beyond the traditional photography. That's when I felt I can make colleges, I can cut it, I can draw over it.

Can write over it. That came in the same year as, uh, going to Sri Lanka. Uh, in that way. There is some connection, I guess. And then, um, I belong to a group called, uh, har for Share Photo Forum, a group of photographers. It's, we meet in St. Alban's, so we did a, we did a group project to be presented at the, uh, St.

Alban's, uh, museum. The title of the theme of the group exhibition was Invisible Threads. So in every work I do, I do quite a bit of research because I cannot decide quickly what to do takes time for me. So I had to do research, I had to find out, I had to read. So I came upon, came upon this idea of looking at, um, Saint Alban and his story and his connection to Saint Albans.

Saint Alban, uh, was, um, before he came as Saint, he was Alban. He was, he was alive during, during the Roman period, nearly the end of Roman period in St. Albans. He, um, protected a Christian priest called, uh, AMFI. Belu. And for that he was beheaded and, uh, amfi. Belu was also beheaded. So it became a symbol of refuge, uh, giving refuge to other people and sacrificing his life for that.

His dedication and the freedom of speech, all that, uh, all that was stirred up, uh, in my mind about the work. So then I did deep, deep, deep into the history of St. Albans and there were all lots of political maneuverings bots of the St. Alban's Church, confiscating the fishing area. And flooding the place because there was a trade competition.

So all these things on all these intrigues, uh, attracted me. So I did that work. So it became, uh, invisible threats of Saint Albans. And uh, then again, uh, I did some work around View from Living Room. I did a small series about what do we see from our living room. These walls and, uh, uh, and it is surrounded by the comfort of our living room in, in the West.

And, uh, the recent project, uh, called Kumon, which I showed in Harrow, April, may last year, and, uh, at the Quaker Friend's house in Westminster. December, uh, January and on Mon Sun on on Sunday, 1st of February, we, I closed it. It is about, again, going back to the beach in Sri Lanka. I went there 2024 and um, I was reflecting this time, I was reflecting on the losses.

The whole country suffered during the three decades of war. 83 to 2009. There were 90,000 Tamil women, uh, widowed in that period. We don't have a count of military losses. Uh, governments don't release those figures. So 30 year war means there would've been substantial losses in the single, uh, south where mostly military, military came from.

And also during that period, we had a, uh, a pricing called the, uh. JVP Uprising People, liberation Front Uprising. From 1988 to 1990, that's about 60,000 deaths. So I'm beginning to thinking, think beginning to think about all the losses, all these numbers. Began to think that this period, that three decades, the country lost thousands.

Thousands of people. So the Project Kung is a reflection on that and, uh, remembrance of those losses and remembrance of what war took away from us. And, uh, using the Kung Kung is a red powder that Tamal women wear. Married Tamal women wear as a dot on their forehead. And, um, when their husbands die, they mostly, they don't, they stop wearing it.

So that became a symbol for me. That red powder became a metaphor for all these losses. So I did a performance in the beach, in the same beach. I'm talking about Al Beach with the powder dissolving the powder on the water, and I photographed the water. So Mark, the, the marks that the, uh, white powder left on the beach and it created some abstracts, markings, and I showed that as well as other photographs I'd taken, I took during that time.

The project worked well, I, it has, it has become, I'm using it as a, uh, catalyst, uh, uh, piece for conversation. About losses amongst Tamils and among ese, among Muslims, also for all losses. The question I'm raising is that, uh, what it means for us to acknowledge our own loss and what it means for us to acknowledge other people's losses.

Those two questions seem simple, but they're both difficult. We have difficulty acknowledging our own losses for many reasons, and, uh, when we cannot do that. We cannot also acknowledge other people's losses. We, without these two happening, a ground for understanding each other, ground for empathy, cannot be, cannot come to place.

So that is the question that's coming out to that project. So I'm thinking of it as a touring conversation. So that is the latest and current project, quite a bit of work to do in taking this, uh, conversation forward. And I've seen that project, the, the most recent that you've mentioned, the KU Cumin. And I have to say it's quite a powerful exhibition.

And you know, there are quite a few themes that you've touched on, but I'll start from the latest one you were talking about. The thing that really came to mind was grief. Yes. You know, when there is conflict, when there's death, you know, and you're talking about. Any death. But when you get into thousands and hundreds of thousands, it's almost unfathomable that yeah, a level of, of death and destruction and, you know, in terms of not only human life, but also the environment and, you know, and animal life and ecosystems and things.

Yeah. And you know, I, I was struck by what you said about having that conversation about, well, how do you, how do you have that conversation to grieve personally, but also to grieve for. Others, and particularly across that, perhaps the divide, for lack of better phrase of the people on the other side that were the other.

Yes. That's not an easy one. I know by showing to Tamil people, mainly when Tamil young people came here, uh, came to see the exhibition from the diaspora, they say, we don't know about it. My parents don't tell us. These parents, many of the parents would've left the country after the, as a result of the, of the, of the troubles of the three decades.

Uh, yet the children say this. So we see people don't tell amongst themselves. They don't talk among themselves as a self preservation, as a, as a responsibility for the children because they don't want to traumatize their children. But children are cur, young people are curious. They look at. Gaza, they look at other wars and they were wondering, oh, we were also affected by war.

So what was that? What is that detail? So that is the difficulty amongst the community itself, the Tamil community itself, and um. People in Sri Lanka did not get as much information as people outside got during the, during the war. There's a Channel four documentary, uh, that came out, uh, but people, it was banned inside the country.

Information within the country that went to the wider public was about how well the Army is doing against these terrorists. On the Tamil side, Tamils, were getting what the, the group called LTTE, Tamil Tigers, they were broadcasting and Tamil people were receiving information broadcasted by Tamil Tigers.

So nobody, nobody were getting, uh, balanced, uh, information of the development of the war, uh, or casualties equally on both sides. So there's no understanding, common understanding of the war and the courses of the war. War came about because of inequalities, uh, lack of historic education in history. Both communities, uh, both communities have a common heritage and, uh, common ancestors as well, but that those, that sort of information is not.

It's not part of the, part of the general curriculum. So, uh, we think they are different Tams, think sese are different. Sese thinks tams are different, so there's no grounds. So the, your question is, how do we create this, uh, conversation? This is the reason we had to create a conversation and, uh. I think my contribution is a small contribution to raise this awareness, this, uh, possibility.

And, uh, this need. There is something that I started thinking about after seeing an article by, uh, anthropologist called, uh, PDI. Ja, uh, written some time back in that he develops this theory about. Uh, violence. His, uh, formulation is that, uh, conditions of possibilities of violence. So there are conditions of possibilities for violence to erupt that is in education, uh, in what politicians speak, what newspaper talks cover.

So. I I using that, I thought, what are the conditions for the possibilities of peace? So I'm say, uh, in this project, I'm saying as a result of the project, I'm beginning to think that if communities can acknowledge both their losses, their own, other people's losses, there is room for empathy with one another.

And if education can open up the common with the understanding of common heritage, then that is a grounds. That's not everything, but at least that is the two, uh, which can be done by artists, academics, or ordinary people, civic society. Up to now, we have left everything to the politicians and the state.

To do these things and they don't have the imagination or interest to do that. So that is my contribution. It is not an easy task because the political space, it is only in the political space. These are talked, the conflict, I call it conflict, is talked about. And, um, it is polarized. Although we have a new government, which doesn't stir ethnic hatred, but uh.

It, it, it threads very carefully because it can upset the majority single east, or it can, uh, activate nationalist single and nationalist politicians. So that's, so the government has to thread very, very carefully. On the Tamal side, mainly tamal politicians have to talk about, uh, how they cannot give up national liberation type of discourses.

So communities are politicized and in that sense, polarized. So how do you, how do you, uh, create this conversation? I'm testing this out also, I'm saying the losses are losses, not the loss of a soldier and not the loss of a LTT Fighter Freedom Fighter. Not a loss of a member of an ethnic community, but loss of a human being.

A mother or a wife has lost her son or husband. If we can think like that. So we are thinking of these d uh, losses. Uh, of the deaths free from the ideological links. These d losses had idea of the state or majority state or idea of, uh, thermal liberation. Not that they're unimportant, but if we, for a moment, if we can think of these as human losses.

That may shift our mindset, make us think about others. I inquired about what happened if any projects happened in bringing these families together. So I was, I was told that there was one short project where Tamil [families who lost their, uh, beloved. Were introduced, uh, taken to, and they lived in singular families who lost, uh, their members in the war.

And the singular families also came and stayed in Tamil families. And I spoke to one person who was involved in that project from the Tamil side. She said to me that, uh, before going to stay with them, they had all these fears that our terrorists have killed their son or husband, how they would receive us.

But when they were introduced, when they met, they interacted at the human level, not in the level of tunnels or sese. Enemy or friend. So, but it was a short project. So I think it is, it is possible by opening, leaving aside ideas and politics and opening the possibility that these are human beings we are talking about, we are dealing with and it is possible.

And also, uh. There is, there is trauma on both sides that is trauma is valid and it has to be, it has to be, uh, honest or nurtured. But, uh, there's also a question, what do we do with trauma or loss? If we are to think of the future, then we have to think about the losses as something to build on as well. So it is this, this kinds of thinking that I am.

Trying to, um, think, think through, also think with other people. And I had, uh, so as a result during the exhibition, I had several conversations, both when I showed it in Harrow and also at the Quaker meeting House. Lots of conversations with people who came and there were organized conversations as well.

Uh, I had a conversation with Mal, uh, with an invited audience. And, uh, Malford and I, we mentor each other. We support each other's work. So we have a lot of conversations outside this. So I had a conversation about, uh, about this with ma and audience joined in and I did a workshop with another young person, a young diaspora Tamil, uh, who is interested in how Tamils navigate spaces in this country.

So I had a conversation, uh, we had two workshops. They were creative workshops. To help people to talk about these issues and, uh, interrogate the photographs as well. So, um, my idea is to do it more, uh, with other people. Yeah. No, definitely. And it sounds quite powerful as well, and it's not, yeah, it, the thing that I'm really getting out of speaking to other, you know, to oth you and other artists is the power of dialogue, the power of art, the help with that dialogue.

Yes. You know, and, and like, you know, the topic and it can be very difficult topics like yours in terms of Yeah. You know, processing grief, processing trauma through to, you know, the. Environment, you know, how we treat the environment and that sort of thing and other things as well. Yes. But it's that kind of, I don't know, funding as we mentioned earlier, funding that common thread or funding that invisible thread.

Yes. We're human, aren't we? Exactly. I think, um, all artists, what we are doing, whatever we do, in one sense, uh, it is for pleasure. It is to keep our minds, uh, healthy. But it's also about repair, repairing traumas or thinking about damaged environment. So we don't want it to continue to be damaged. So it's all way of way of repairing and preserving it, preserving memories, preserving land.

That's, that's, I think that's what art is doing. And art is also very useful medium in terms of, uh. Introducing the difficult questions. You, it works. It's not manipulation, but certainly you put forward possibilities. You don't have to spell out everything and people come with questions or suggestions and commentary based on what is shown in my work.

I show cotton cotton reel. Which was found in near Al Beach and that in that cotton reel there is a needle that has, that has rusted and look red. And the, the broken threads of the cotton cotton reel is sort of, looks like it is flying. So somebody said yesterday on Sunday that it's a very violent looking.

Image. It could. It could be. We can't see. It has been used to repair somebody's clothes. It also looks like exploding bomb caught in a split second. So with that just one image, the person sees repairs and sees ex violence, and uh, when I showed Kung. When, when the KUM is also as a is also done, my performance is done as a video as well, shown as a video in that people were seeing their memories, their, they see blood as well, but also they see the cultural elements that are used to preserve and used as a reminder.

All kinds of things people can get to read. Through artwork, not everything is intended by the artist and uh, we are simply responding to some things and the people will respond. That is so true. Sorry to talk over you, but that's so true that yes, you are not alone in saying that I've hadn't, you know, myself showing my photography, but also other people showing artwork, saying once it's out there, it kind of takes a life of its own and people see things exactly as you say that perhaps you didn't see or think of or Yeah.

Occurred to you. Yeah. It gives us, uh, art really gives us a, a nice way into people's minds and hearts and brain. If you write an article, you had to sort out everything. You had to, you had to do your research, you had to have your argument, you had to have good conclusions. With art, you don't have to do it.

You can just open up, you can have some ambitions and in intentions. Intentions of unity, intentions of love, intention, intentions of understanding. But uh, as you have to do in an academic, uh, essay, you don't have to do it in an, in an in art. You just create this environment and possibility on the pages or in the artwork, people will see it.

And then, then if you can continue with conversations, create some opportunities. Create collaboration with others. It can go a bit further. I agree with that. The last question I have is, what's next? Where do you think your work is taking you, or where would you like to see, or if you have a plan, where would you like to see it go?

Yeah. Uh, this work itself con in a way. It is not, in a way, it's not a separate project. It's a con. It's one point of a continuous, uh, theme that I deal with, and it has really worked well. Uh, I think for me, I feel very good about it. So that itself has some, some things to be done. It has to be a book with some writing.

Some people said it has a possibility of an educational. Work, a educational book on peace, that kind of stuff. And I want to have more conversations and more workshops linked to this and see who can, who can come in my way to collaborate. So that is in, in relation to this work. So it has, it has some work to do or a lot of work to do in this, uh, uh, arising from the work.

But I have, I have talked in. Sri Lanka and I talked in Toronto as well. More of that can be done. I like to do more of the conversation in Sri Lanka in the south. That's, that is one in relation to this work. Uh, there's another project I had in mind for some time is about a beauty queen from one part of the south of Srilanka who was, uh.

Killed, uh, by the Army in 1971, suspected of being a terrorist, a terrorist of the J-V-P-J-V-P uprising. I said people liberation, front uprising. In 1971, there were two uprisings by JVP 1 71 and one in 88 90. So she was, uh, killed. I am happy thinking about that. I was, I was, uh, in Sri Lanka at that time and it was a brutal killing and, uh, thinking of the beauty Queen and the country, which is portrait as a beautiful country, pearl of the Indian Ocean, it is a place of tourist attraction.

Uh, uh, it's lots of, it is naturally a beautiful country. But the country is, uh, has had full of, it's full of violence from 1948, uh, to 2009. Uh, we had all kinds of violence, political, parliamentary, parliamentary violence in the, in the sense, a removal of the citizenship of, uh, hill Country Tamil, for example.

That's a violent act. Overnight, they removed that later. There were killings of, uh, protestors then, uh, uh, lots of political killings, pogroms against Tamils. So I'm thinking of this beauty and the violence. Uh, violence is perpetrated on this beauty queen. Similarly, the violence is perpetrated on the country.

It is a project I've been thinking for some time. So hopefully I will make some progress on that work. I hope so too. Yes, yes. Yeah. Apart from that, uh, all this, I think, uh, joining, I told you I only started visual work after coming here. Before that I have written poems and interested in other people's poetry and uh, uh, short stories and so on.

Coming here around, uh, the formation, I was around the formation of London Independent Photography. Uh, it's a group of, uh, like-minded photographers. It's, uh, basic ethos. It's to use, uh, about encouraging use of photography as a self-expression. I remember at the beginning itself, Paul Hill and Virginia, Cory and the founders say, said about a London independent Photography's purpose is not for competition.

Not to lay the rule about what is a good photograph, but to encourage people to, uh, express themselves through photography. And that, uh, that association has helped me a lot. So right from the start, I've been thinking, uh, I've been concerned about how do I express emotions through photography. So the book I mentioned earlier, the Oh to Sri Lanka is, uh, my emotions, my, uh, grief about country losing its ways that express through photograph, uh, through flowers.

So that kind of, uh, focus that. Lip gave me has been very, very useful. Yeah. It is really, uh, sometimes frustrating because you don't understand. You come from a background where everything is, uh, defined and where here you, so they say. You express yourself. So what is my feeling? How do I express it? So you are supposed to, uh, think about all these things.

Yeah. Uh, but encouragement was always to do something. Do it. Don't worry too much, just do it. And then, then you think, Alec, I found that doing first and then thinking about it has been a very useful process. So creativity, uh, cannot be planned or should not be planned, but I think you have, if you have some, some things that irritate you, something inspires you, something agitates you.

So if you have a vision to, to have all that in your mind and create something and something will come, indeed. And unfortunately we'll have to come to a close. Okay. I'm sure we could probably speak for hours. So you're incredibly interesting sub and I really wanna thank you for being a guest on, on this podcast.

Thank you, Heather. Thank you for having me. And it is a, it is a right, uh, moment for me to do this podcast with you because, uh, I've just finished the exhibition of Kunkumam before. I do another iteration of it to do this talk. It's been very useful. Very good. Thank you. Well, thank you. Thanks and good luck with your future podcast.

Thank you. And good luck with your fu future, uh, projects. Yeah. Thank you, Heather. Thank you very much. Thanks for tuning into my conversation with subs. His work reflects communities affected by conflict and also allows space to explore its impact and enables dialogue. More information about Sebas is in the show notes.

In the next episode, I have a conversation with Tinsel [Edwards. She's a painter and multi-discipline maker who draws on lived experience from motherhood to the everyday pressures of domestic life. You won't want to miss it.