Thalawatta plays with the corporeal and the material to create his pieces, which range from the disciplines of painting to installation art to graphics. He talks about his work as follows: “my artwork bring attention to body, memory and displacement looking at the complex, convoluted politics of the everyday.” He is interested in exploring the exotic nature of materials and objects derived from the everyday urban atmosphere, playing with the unique textures and colours they engender.

His work “Diyatha Uyana” (2014) is a self-portrait where he appears to be drowning in a swimming pool holding a framed photograph of a highly urbanized city with high-rise buildings. This is an expression of remembrance of the times gone by, and a reflection on the decisions of the then government to develop the city of Sri Jayawardenapura Kotte as an urban area. It also focuses on the theme of amnesia about the war: while the uneasy facial expressions on the drowning Thalawatta are disorienting, and reminiscent of the suffering people underwent during the war, the photograph of the city forces the viewer to contemplate on how rapidly the country has forgotten the atrocities of the war. The motif of his own image helps him to successfully express his own opinions and political standpoints, while appealing to the emotions of his audience as well.

Another instance where he used urban material in a novel way is his video installation “Line in the City” (2014) in which he walks around the city of Lahore, Pakistan, passing flyovers, high rise buildings, apartment complexes and the constant traffic, dressed simply in a linen shirt and denim jeans. It is then revealed to the viewer that he is in fact marking his path or ‘line’ with a roll of white toilet paper. Jyoti Dhar, reflecting on this piece, suggests that for Thalawatta, “weaving a line through the city was a way of underscoring and observing social behaviour, as well as charting an alternative and accidental map of a metropolitan landscape.” Combined with the reactions of the persons on his path who witness the act first-hand and the simple motif of the roll of toilet paper, “Line in the City” signifies the manner in which the urban has taken over humans’ lives, and how deeply immersed we are in the structure and landscape of a city.