Sybil Wettasinghe is a self-taught artist who has written and
illustrated fifty children’s books. Starting at the age
of fifteen years, she has illustrated over hundred books authored
by others. Sybil Wettasinghe worked as a newspaper journalist,
a feature writer and an artist since the age of seventeen. Her
children’s book ‘Umbrella Thief’ won the Japan
Special Prize as the best children’s book by a foreign author,
published in Japan in 1986. Subsequently, Umbrella Thief was published
in Norway, Denmark, Sweden, China, Korea and the USA. Since then,
two more of her books have been published in Japan.
Sybil Wettasinghe has won many national and international awards
for her writing and illustrating. She works with Asia Pacific
Cultural Center for UNESCO in Japan in their co-publication programs
and is a resource person for regional workshops on children’s
book production.
