Ashni Singh

b. 2002, India

Lives and works in Jaipur, Rajasthan

Ashni Singh is a visual artist and illustrator. Her work comes from an unflinching observation of the tender, absurd and ironic moments that are wrapped in everyday life. The world she creates comes from small, unguarded moments, private rituals, overheard conversations, and the quiet absurdities of being a woman in India today. She draws inspiration from photographs in her camera roll, daily observations and the emotional debris of relationships, heartbreak and odd tenderness found in public spaces that were never designed for women. These fragments become drawings and paintings that oscillate between humour and exasperation, softness and scrutiny.

She navigate the territories of girlhood, womanhood, daughterhood and the expectation imposed upon it by exploring the rituals and rhythms of childhood, the weight and wonder of growing into yourself, the ways in which intimacy is constructed, maintained, and sometimes fractured. Singh is interested in how early misogyny forms, how little boys are shaped into men who distrust women, how love is policed, and how the female body becomes public property long before it becomes self-owned.Her images move between interiors and exteriors, oscillating between what happens inside one’s head or home and what unfolds under the watchful eyes of society. Her choice of medium- the richness of oil paints and the immediacy of oil pastels, allow for a visual language that mirrors her thematic concerns.

Ultimately, Singh’s work is an ongoing exploration of what it means to be seen and to see oneself, to occupy space both physical and psychological, to move through the world with all its freedoms and constraints.