£500 - £600
"Untitled" - ARPITA SINGH (B. 1937), Water Colour on Paper.
A vivid and narrative-rich watercolour on paper, this work centres on a barefoot woman clad in a bright floral sari, surrounded by a dreamlike tapestry of urban life. Rendered in Singh’s signature style, the background is filled with delicately inked vignettes of daily scenes—bicyclists, meditating figures, vehicles, airplanes, and abstracted faces—interspersed with blooming pink flowers. The dense, rhythmic black marks evoke a pulsating, chaotic cityscape, while the foreground figure remains serene and contemplative.
Arpita Singh, born in 1937 in Baranagar, West Bengal, is one of India’s most prominent contemporary artists, known for her deeply expressive, narrative-rich works that blend memory, mythology, and modernity. Trained at the Delhi Polytechnic in the 1950s, she initially worked as a textile designer, which informed the vivid patterns and tactile quality of her paintings. Her artistic style defies easy categorization, oscillating between folk aesthetics, miniature painting traditions, and postmodern figuration. Her works often center around female figures, depicted in surreal, dreamlike settings filled with layered symbolism, domestic objects, and fragments of personal or political history.
Arpita Singh’s accomplishments are wide-ranging and significant. She has been honored with some of India's highest artistic accolades, including the Padma Bhushan in 2011 and the Kalidas Samman in 2015. She also received the Lalit Kala Akademi Fellowship, recognizing her lifelong contribution to Indian art. Internationally acclaimed, her works have been exhibited in major museums and biennales across the world, and she remains a towering influence on generations of younger artists. Singh’s art not only explores the inner lives of women but also bears witness to the broader social and political fabric of India, marking her as a powerful voice in contemporary art.
Approximately 53 x 38.5cm
Provenance: Private collection from a distinguished USA collector.
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