Shaun Tan

Shaun Tan (born 15 January 1974) is an Australian artist, writer and film maker. He won an <a href="/facts/Academy_Awards/CwTxYuNQ">Academy Award</a> for <a href="/facts/The_Lost_Thing/AQ93vrel">The Lost Thing</a>, a 2011 animated short film adaptation of the 2000 picture book he wrote and illustrated. He also wrote and illustrated the books <a href="/facts/The_Red_Tree_(picture_book)/ftA7jAJH">The Red Tree</a> (2001) and <a href="/facts/The_Arrival_(graphic_novel)/2WnRgjvW">The Arrival</a> (2006).
Born in <a href="/facts/Fremantle/33FXfayE">Fremantle</a>, Tan grew up in <a href="/facts/Perth/63YUr99S">Perth</a>. In 2006, his wordless <a href="/facts/Graphic_novel/sWyy9KAg">graphic novel</a> The Arrival won the Book of the Year prize as part of the <a href="/facts/New_South_Wales_Premier%2527s_Literary_Awards/rDzSGQIV">New South Wales Premier's Literary Awards</a>. It also won the 2007 <a href="/facts/Children%2527s_Book_Council_of_Australia/tw5TGPud">Children's Book Council of Australia</a> <a href="/facts/Children%2527s_Book_of_the_Year_Award%3a_Picture_Book/xrU0paJI">Picture Book of the Year</a> award, and the 2006 <a href="/facts/Western_Australian_Premier%2527s_Book_Awards/CscJegk7">Western Australian Premier's Book Awards</a> Premier's Prize.
Tan's work has been described as an "Australian vernacular" that is "at once banal and uncanny, familiar and strange, local and universal, reassuring and scary, intimate and remote, <a href="/facts/Street_children/NsjNa6gg">guttersnipe</a> and <a href="/facts/Sprezzatura/JVAefGpz">sprezzatura</a>. No rhetoric, no straining for effect. Never other than itself." For his career contribution to "children's and young adult literature in the broadest sense", Tan won the 2011 <a href="/facts/Astrid_Lindgren_Memorial_Award/YR7yS1AE">Astrid Lindgren Memorial Award</a> from the Swedish Arts Council, the biggest prize in children's literature.

Shaun Tan open-in-new

Shaun Tan