Art historian, scholar, writer, and winner of the prestigious 2018 Infosys Prize for Humanities, Kavita Singh, passed away on Sunday after battling cancer for over two years, people aware of the development told HT. Singh was 58.
“She was battling cancer for some time. She was one of the most remarkable art historians in India and with a deep commitment and knowledge of not just the history of Indian art but also how it was presented. Her work has been pioneering in the field of art history,” Naman Ahuja, professor of Indian art at Jawaharlal Nehru University and one of Singh’s former colleagues told HT.
Several people who were directly or indirectly touched by Singh’s work took to social media to express their thoughts.
Scottish historian William Dalrymple took to Twitter and said that Singh’s passing was the “saddest news” while underling how her loss was “irreparable”.
“This is the saddest news… RIP lovely, brilliant Kavita Singh who always dazzled @JaipurLitFest with her fabulous insights to Mughal painting and did so much to educate us all on obscure recesses of Indian art history. What an irreplaceable loss!,” Dalrymple tweeted.
“Professor Kavita Singh declined one of our review requests just a couple of days back, and it was the kindest and the most honest no ever. Rest in peace, Professor, you will be remembered for your invaluable work and kindness,” Publishing Head of Academics at Cambridge University, Qudsiya Ahmed, wrote on Twitter.
Singh served at the Jawaharlal Nehru University’s School of Arts and Aesthetics, where she taught for nearly two decades since it was founded, while also serving as its dean. She was an art curator at the National Museum and wrote several books such as “New Insights Into Sikh Art”, “InFlux: Contemporary Art in Asia”, and “No Touching, No Spitting, No Praying: The Museum in South Asia”, among other publications.
She was the recipient of numerous accolades including her the Infosys Prize for her study of Mughal, Rajput, and Deccan art. Her work highlighted the significance of museums in creating the social impact of art and thereby, related visual culture to large contemporary questions of secularity, modernity, and political conflict.
Singh obtained a BA in English literature from Lady Shri Ram College, University of Delhi, in 1985 and an MFA in Art History from the Faculty of Fine Arts, Maharaja Sayajirao University, Vadodara in 1987. She completed her PhD in art history at Panjab University, Chandigarh in 1996. Singh also served as a visiting lecturer at the College of Art, New Delhi, between 1989 and 1991, and taught at the National Institute of Fashion Technology, New Delhi from 1991 to 1997.
Singh has published several essays on secularism and religiosity, fraught national identities, and the memorialisation of difficult histories as they relate to museums in South Asia and beyond. She has also published on aspects of Mughal and Rajput painting.
Economist Jayati Ghosh also took to Twitter and said that a “wonderful human being was lost” in Singh’s passing. “We’ve lost such a wonderful human being. Kavita Singh was brave, brilliant, and committed. A pillar of strength at JNU who kept her academic contributions flowing even while managing the most immense challenges in the university and from her health. May she continue to inspire others,” Ghosh said.
Several of Singh’s students also took to Twitter to express their grief over her passing.
Former JNU students’ union president, N Sai Balaji, said “She had the best tea on campus… whenever a student visited her, she would ensure that they had a cup of tea”. Students also remembered her as a ‘fighter’ who stood up for them when needed.
“Kavita Singh Ma’am wrote wonderful recommendation letters for me when I needed them. She was all encouraging, loving and brilliant…,” Shaheen Ahmed, one of Singh’s students, wrote on Twitter.
