Kelly Sinnapah Mary

Kelly Sinnapah Mary (born 1981) is a french artist from Guadaloupe mostly known for her paintings about creole culture. Her artworks are inspired by decolonization and feminism.

Life Kelly Sinnapah Mary was born in 1981 in Saint-François, Guadeloupe, to a tamil family. She grew up amongst hindu and catholic indo-caribbeans.

She holds a degree in fine arts from Toulouse University.

Her first exhibition happened in Guadeloupe in 2012.

In 2025, she was awarded the "Étant donnés" prize by the Villa Albertine residency program for the painting "The Book of Violette : Marie-Anne".

Themes Kelly Sinnapah Mary works with a variety of mediums : painting, sculpture, sewing, photography, videography, performance, braiding and collage. She is inspired by Wangechi Mutu, Suzanne Césaire, Maryse Condé, Édouard Glissant, Aimé Césaire and Khal Torabully.

She is interested in indo-caribbean identities in the french West Indies, which she talks about in postcolonial terms. She is herself of indian descent, and expresses the experience of being both Black and Indian through her art. Indian indenture and its ramifications in collective memory is at the heart of her practice.

Womanhood and gender issues have been present in Kelly Sinnapah Mary's artwork since her 2013 installation entitled "Vagina". She uses autofiction to paint her younger self under the guise of an avatar called Sanbras. Sanbras has been appearing in her paintings since 2020. Her name comes from the title character in The Story of Little Black Sambo. In 2025, she made the series of paintings "The Book of Violette" that deals with female puberty, femininity and matriarchy.

Kelly Sinnapah Mary isn't trying to have a feminist point of view, but is using art to explore her own identity. However, she often represents women's experiences and bodies in a sexist, racist and imperialist context. Overall, she is interested in social power dynamics.

Artworks

2013 : "Vagina" (installation) 2018- : "Notebook of no return" (series of paintings) 2022 : "A Natural Turn", in collaboration with Joiri Minaya, María Berrío and Rosana Paulino at DePaul Art Museum 2024 : "The Fables of Sanbras" (series of paintings) 2025 : "The Book of Violette" (series of paintings)