How do you see me? Me, the person? Me, the illness — or both?

UN SEEN ME — The Journey from Clinician to Canvas is a solo exhibition by Sri Lankan-born, Manchester-based interdisciplinary contemporary artist and former rheumatologist Dr Shanali Perera.

Drawing on Perera’s dual perspective as former physician and patient-turned-artist, the exhibition asks what remains unseen when illness becomes the lens through which a person is understood. Moving between acrylic painting, digital and moving image, hybrid media and transformed objects, the work shifts the act of looking away from clinical observation towards lived experience, identity and personhood.

UN SEEN ME marks the first complete presentation of Living, Loving, Mess (2021–2026), Perera’s inaugural acrylic collection, alongside selected works from her wider interdisciplinary practice.

At its heart is a simple assertion: I am not the illness. I am a person first.

Opening Preview & Panel: Thursday 19 November, 6–9pm.

Public exhibition: Friday 20, Monday 23 and Tuesday 24 November, 10am–4pm.

Free entry. SEESAW, 86 Princess Street, Manchester M1 6NG.