Sandeep TK is an artist from Thalassery in Kerala, who is currently based in Bangalore.
Working with photography, video and text, he explores queer, caste, class and colour
identities in the Indian context and beyond, often drawing from personal experience. In
addition to his own artistic practice, he manages the programming at 1Shanthiroad
Studio/Gallery, a renowned community art space.
Sandeep has held three solo exhibitions of his photographic work: Singularity at Gallery
Sumukha, Bangalore (2018), Let me add something in my melody at Villa Renata, Basel
(2022), and Toy Boy from Malabar and his journey to wine, cheese and cholocates at
Gallery Sumukha, Bangalore (2024). His photographic work has been exhibited in several
group shows including at Khoj Studios, Delhi (2021), Kunst Museum, Wolfsburg (2022),
and Serendipity Art Festival, Goa (2023). His video work has been showcased at the
Bangalore Queer Film Festival (2019), the Palace International Queer Film Festival, Bristol
(2020), and the festival of Video Art by Indian Contemporary Artists (2021), among others.
In 2019, Sandeep was awarded the Paradise Air arts residency in Tokyo. In 2020, he won
the prestigious Inlaks Fine Art Award in India. In 2021, he was one of the five artists
selected for the Khoj Peers Residency in Delhi. In 2022, he was awarded the Pro Helvetia
Studio Residency Award, which he undertook at the Atelier Mondial in Basel. Later in 2022, he
took up the Robert Bosch Crossing Borders grant, which he had been awarded during the
pandemic, to document alternative families in Berlin. In 2023, he was chosen as one of five
Serendipity Arles Grantees, in recognition for lens-based media work in South Asia.
Upcoming: in 2024, Sandeep will be the Artist-in-Residence at the Ontario College of Art &
Design (September’24-November’24), a fellow of Sweden’s International Programme for Visual
and Applied Arts (November’24-February’25), and will exhibit four works at a show devoted to
colonialism at the Swiss National Museum, Zurich (April’25).
