Kulpreet Singh
Born 1985, India
Lives and works in Patiala, India 

Indelible Black Marks I (1) / (3) / (4) / (6) / (11) / (12) / (13) / (17) / (18) 2021-22
laser and letter press ink on rice paper
Presentation at the 25th Biennale of Sydney was made possible by Rubaiya Qatar, Qatar Museums
Courtesy of the artist and Galerie Mirchandani + Steinruecke, Mumbai/New Delhi

Through a series of performances-turned-painting and film, Punjabi artist Kulpreet Singh reflects on the literal and symbolic black stains inscribed on the global ecosystem. Beginning in 2020, the Indelible Black Marks series is inspired by India’s Green Revolution and the violence enacted upon farmers and environments alike. 

Beginning in the 1960s, the Green Revolution was a development program which forced Indian farmers to adopt new technologies, irrigation systems, pesticides and agricultural practices to generate higher yield crops such as rice and wheat. However, these strategies polluted waterways, corrupted soil quality, drastically undermined indigenous crop cultivation, and drove many farmers into debt. 

This ecological mark-making is continued in the series Indelible Black Marks I, which speaks to the 738 farmers whose lives were lost fighting for food security during the 2020-21 Farmer’s Movement. A response to three parliamentary bills which would leave India’s already vulnerable farmers at the mercy of corporate profit, the protests were met with state and police brutality. Ink and paper are torn and burned not only in acknowledgement of the frailty of bureaucracy in the face of environmental collapse, but the ways in which violence is increasingly symbolic not of protest but of policy.