Malkit Singh
Painter
Chandigarh 1986
Photo by Amarjit Chandan
Born in Landey in Moga district of the Punjab in 1943 Malkit Singh graduated from Art College Shimla. Was Secretary of the Punjab Lalit Kalā [Fine Arts] Akademi for six years.
Malkit has paved his way to the present position by sheer dint of hard work. Through his affable, demure and cordial mien, he has won many a friend in almost every walk of life. And this certainly reflects in his works which he renders with complete devotion and involvement.
Like his likable low-key persona, his drawings or paintings never show any commotion, even while dealing with subjects relating overtly to turmoil.
Apart from being an accomplished painter, Malkit has also fine administrative skills. In the six years during which he remained Secretary of the Punjab Lalit Kala Akademi, it bubbled with art activities, mostly because of his consummate ability to tie even warring/diverse groups of artists together. No wonder his long and sincere artistic travel, from Landey (a sleepy village in Moga district of Punjab) to a global Triennale, has been both smooth and rewarding.
– Balvinder Singh
Malkit Singh’s artistic perceptions deal with the brutality of the existing life forms. Over the years this eco-friendly artist has decided upon “a medium that suits his spontaneous urge to explore the possibilities of the visual presentation of a theme, situation or an idea in abstract or not so abstract images”. His is a constant path of creative innovations for the new and happening, done either in oil or computer graphic images. Essentially a ruralite, Malkit celebrates the positivity of life as a whole and capsules it in his work with a vibrancy of colours.
– Suparna Saraswati
It was one of the exhibitions at Alliance Francaise that drew our attention to goats as an artist’s favourite theme. As part of few compositions, it would have gone unnoticed had Malkit Singh not painted them with elongated necks in bright colours, giving them an almost a surreal aura. But then this is what makes Malkit one of the lovable artists with simple yet artistic bend of mind. So, it came as little surprise when he showed us the rest of his collection — goats in geometric patterns, flying around in myriad colours and hues.
Painting them revived the nostalgia of my childhood days when rearing goats used to be part of life. And there are so many folk tales that revolve around goats says Malkit.
– Parbina Rashid
Painting scenes of the rural life in Punjab was always a passion with Malkit Singh ever since he started wielding the brush in the Art School at Shimla in 1967. It is in his ruralscapes and portaryal of the peasant folk that he is at his best and most honest. Coming from a peasant family of the twin villages of Rode-Lande, near Moga, Malkit is rooted as they come and the golden fields, an occasional tree, a scarecrow, sturdy tillers of the land and silent but strong daughters of the soil came alive on his canvases in surrealistic compositions year after year. His recent work on Bulle Shah is an extentsion of this passion.
_ Nirupama Dutt
Contact Malkit Singh at: artistmalkitsingh@yahoo.com
More by Amarjit Chandan at Uddari Art:
People Punjab: Portraits
Windows, Doors and Dwellings
Haunting Faces, Amarjit Chandan Collection
Habib Jalib Photo Profile
Amarjit Chandan: Profile
Web Thekaanay
Amarjit Chandan
Uddari Weblog
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