Shani Rhys James was born in Melbourne, Australia in 1953 and trained at Loughborough School of Art and St Martins School of Art, graduating with a BA (Hons) in Painting in 1976. Since moving to Mid-Wales in 1984, she has developed a body of work of exceptional range — from large-scale figurative painting to sculptural automata, sound installation, and video.
Her awards include the Aberystwyth Open, the Mostyn Open, the Gold Medal at the National Eisteddfod, the Hunting Observer Art Prize, the BP National Portrait Award, BBC Wales Visual Artist of the Year (1994), the Jerwood Painting Prize (2003), and two Creative Wales Awards from the Arts Council of Wales (2006 and 2013). She was appointed MBE for services to Welsh Art in 2006 and received an Honorary Fellowship from Wrexham Glyndŵr University in 2017. In 2015 she was artist-in-residence at Columbia University, New York.

Two monographs have been published on Shani's work. She has exhibited with Martin Tinney Gallery, Cardiff from 1992 to 2022, and with Connaught Brown, Mayfair since 2009, where her most recent solo show, States of Mind, was held in 2024; a new solo exhibition is forthcoming there in 2026. Major touring exhibitions include Blood Ties, initiated by Wrexham Arts Centre (1993); The Black Cot, initiated by Aberystwyth Arts Centre (2003); and Rivalry of Flowers (2013), which also travelled to Kings Place, London. Further solo presentations include a retrospective at the National Library of Wales, Aberystwyth (2015), and Tea on the Sofa, Blood on the Carpet at the Wolfson Gallery, Charleston (2020). Recent and upcoming exhibitions include The Golden Echo at Celf Gallery, Cardiff, an invited work in Ground Zero 360, New York (2026), and an invitation to the Royal Academy Summer Exhibition (2026). Her work is held in major public collections across the UK, including the National Museum of Wales and the Gallery of Modern Art, Glasgow.