Who is Shaun Tan?
Shaun Tan is an Australian artist, author and filmmaker from Perth, known for The Arrival, a wordless graphic novel about migration, and for winning an Academy Award for the animated short film The Lost Thing.
Born in 1974 and raised in the Perth suburbs, Tan has Chinese-Malaysian and Australian heritage. He began illustrating for science fiction magazines as a teenager before creating picture books.
The Arrival, published in 2006, tells the story of a man who leaves his family to find work in a strange new country. Told entirely in pictures, it explores the experience of migration, confusion and belonging.
Awards
Tan's animated adaptation of his book The Lost Thing won the Academy Award for Best Animated Short Film in 2011. In 2011, he also received the Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award, one of the world's biggest children's literature prizes.
His other books include The Red Tree, Tales from Outer Suburbia, Rules of Summer and Cicada, which often feature surreal creatures and quiet, thoughtful themes.
Tan's work is admired by readers of all ages, and his paintings have been exhibited in galleries. He now lives in Melbourne.
Did You Know?
The Arrival was inspired partly by Tan's father's migration from Malaysia to Western Australia.