Born in 1928 to Tamil parents, settled in Simla, Swaminathan started his career as a journalist and writer of stories for children. He studied art at the Delhi Polytechnic and later at the Academy of Fine Arts, Warsaw. In
1966 he founded and edited a monthly journal on art called Contra. In 1981 he started Roopankar, the now famous Museum of Fine Arts at Bharat Bhavan, Bhopal, of which he was Director. He has had more than 30 oneman shows and his work may be seen in many major public collections in India. He was exhibiting with the Kumar Gallery, New Delhi between 1955 and 1965.