Devika Singh is an art historian, art critic and curator who specialises in modern and contemporary art in their global contexts, with a particular emphasis on art in South Asia and the transnational history of 20th-century art. As a critic and curator, Singh has worked with a number of international contemporary artists. At the Courtauld she is the co-lead of the new Masterâs Programme in curating.
Before joining the Courtauld in 2022 she was Curator, International Art at Tate Modern. At Tate she was part of the Hyundai Tate Research Centre: Transnational, leading and convening a number of research events that advanced new perspectives on global art histories. Singh was also the curator in charge of museum displays and acquisitions of South Asian art for the Tate collection. She was previously Smuts Research Fellow at the Centre of South Asian Studies at the University of Cambridge and a fellow at the Centre allemand dâhistoire de lâart (Max Weber Foundation) in Paris. She has been a member of the âObservatoire: Globalisation, Art et Prospectiveâ at the Institut National dâHistoire de lâArt (INHA, Paris).
Devika Singh completed an hypo-khĂągne and a khĂągne at LycĂ©e Condorcet in Paris and holds a BA (first class honours) in the history of art from the University of Cambridge (Kingâs College) and an MA (with distinction) from the Âé¶čTVÍűŐŸ of Art, which was funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Board (AHRB). She worked at Marian Goodman Gallery in Paris before pursuing her PhD in the history of art (Cambridge, 2013) supported by the AHRC and a Knox studentship from Trinity College. Her thesis dealt with the reception and representation of Mughal art and architectural history in twentieth-century India and led to articles in Art History, Modern Asian Studies and the Journal of Art Historiography. She has held an AHRC fellowship at the Kluge Center, Library of Congress, Washington DC, a Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst (DAAD) fellowship at the Freie UniversitĂ€t, Berlin, an AndrĂ© Chastel fellowship of the INHA at the French Academy at Rome (Villa Medici) and was a resident of the Office for Contemporary Art, Oslo (OCA)âs International Studio Programme.
She has curated internationally in a diversity of contexts. She co-curated âGedney in Indiaâ (Jehangir Nicholson Art Foundation, Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya, CSMVS, Mumbai, 2017; Duke University, 2018) and curated exhibitions including âPlanetary Planningâ (Dhaka Art Summit, 2018), the India pavilion at Dubai Photo (Dubai Design District, 2016); âHomelands: Art from Bangladesh, India and Pakistanâ (Kettleâs Yard, Cambridge, 2019-20) as well as a number of displays at Tate Modern including Lee Mingweiâs Our Labyrinth (Turbine Hall, Tate Modern, 2022). She was also a curator of the Voices sector at the last edition of Paris Photo (2025).
Her writing has appeared widely in English and in French in exhibition catalogues of international museums and institutions (including The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the Barbican, the Office for Contemporary Art, Oslo and the Centre Pompidou), in art magazines such as frieze, Art Press and MARG and in the journals Third Text, Modern Asian Studies, the Journal of Art Historiography and Art History. Her book International Departures: Art in India after Independence, for which she received a research grant from the British Academy and a publication grant from the Paul Mellon Centre, was published in December 2023 with Reaktion Books.
She is a member of several professional bodies, including CIMAM, is a founding advisory board member of Art South Asia Project (ASAP), regularly nominates and juries for art prizes, recently jurying for the Rencontres d’Arles, the Cavendish Arts Science fellowship and Studio Voltaire, and she is a joint editor of the Oxford Art Journal.
Current teaching at the Courtauld
MA Curating Programme co-lead (major administrative role)
History and Theory of Curating – MA core module (convenor and lecturer)
Working with Collections – MA elective module (convenor and lecturer)
Group Exhibition Project 1 and 2 – MA core modules (co-convenor and lecturer)
Critical Debates: Migrations – MA core module (lecturer)
Exhibiting Art – BA2 core module (convenor 2024 and 2025; lecturer)
Another Story: A Transnational History of Postwar Exhibitions – BA3 elective module (2023, 2024 and 2025 convenor and lecturer)
Publications
Book monograph:Ìę
International Departures: Art in India after Independence, Reaktion Books, London, 2023
See here for endorsements and excerpts of reviews and book selections in Apollo, Critique d’Art, Les Cahiers du MusĂ©e National d’Art Moderne, Art Margins, Take on Art, Morning StarÌęand Hyperallergic:
Select articles, book chapters and exhibition catalogues (please scroll further down for shorter texts):
(forthcoming) with Ming Tiampo, ‘Venir Ă Paris, venir aux Beaux-Arts ? Formation et artistes des Suds globaux’, in Lucie Lachenal, DĂ©borah Laks, France Nerlich and Alice Thomine-Berrada, Reg’Arts, Beaux Arts de Paris, Paris, 2026.
‘Strangers into Neighbours’, in Tamsin Hong (ed.), Arpita Singh: Remembering, Serpentine, London, 2025, pp. 28-33.
‘Vers de nouvelles narrations de l’art au musĂ©e’ (op-ed), The Art Newspaper (French edition), no. 69, December 2024, p. 12.
‘The City: True and Tangible’, in Shanay Jhaveri (ed.), The Imaginary Institution of India: Art 1975-1998, Barbican, London and Prestel, Munich, 2024, pp. 134-147.
âPlanning and Dreaming: Architecture and the Mediaâ, in Sean Anderson, Anoma Pieris and Martino Stierli (eds), The Project of Independence: Architectures of Decolonization in South Asia, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 2022, pp. 135-141.
âRevisiting the History of SAHMAT: Devika Singh in conversation with Ram Rahmanâ, in Actions of Art and Solidarity Reader: Radical Actions, Politics and Friendships, OCA, Oslo, 2022, pp. 259-268.
âGerman-Speaking Exiles in the Bombay Art Worldâ, in Partha Mitter, Parul Dave Mukherji and Rakhee Balaram (eds), 20th-Century Indian Art, Thames & Hudson, London, 2022, pp. 158-160.
âTransnationalism and the work of Isamu Noguchi: A conversation between Karen Ishizuka, Katy Siegel, Dahn Vo and Devika Singhâ (conversation chair) in Fabienne Eggelhöfer, Rita Kersting and Florence Ostendeâš (eds), Isamu Noguchi, Prestel, Munich, 2021, pp. 254-259.
âA Million Mutinies Now: Art and Architecture in Conflict in 1970s Indiaâ, in Glenn D. Lowry (ed.) Art and Conflict (special issue), MARG, June 2020.
Editor (with Amy Tobin), Homelands: Art from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, Kettleâs Yard, Cambridge, 2019.
âHomelands: An Introductionâ, in Homelands: Art from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, Kettleâs Yard, Cambridge, 2019.
âArchives of Home and Homelessness: Devika Singh in conversation with Homi K. Bhabhaâ, in Homelands: Art from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan, Kettleâs Yard, Cambridge, 2019.
âIndian art and the Bangladesh War: Somnath Hore, K.G. Subramanyan and Bhupen Khakhar in a time of âupheaval and chaosââ, in Natasha Eaton and Alice Correa (eds), Third Text, special issue, Autumn 2017, pp. 459-476.
âGerman-speaking exiles and the writing of Indian art historyâ in Journal of Art Historiography, no.17, December 2017: https://arthistoriography.files.wordpress.com/2017/11/singh.pdf
â âThe Time lived by othersâ: Indian art reviews after independenceâ, in Katya GarcĂa AntĂłn and Antonio Cataldo (eds), Critical Writing Ensemble, Office for Contemporary Art (OCA)/Mousse Publishing, Oslo/Milan, 2017, pp. 218-227.
Guest editor, India-France: Artistic Exchanges, MARG, September-December 2017.
âMukti Bahini Soldierâ, in Chris Dercon and Nada Raza (eds), Bhupen Khakhar: You canât please all, Tate, London, 2016, pp. 32-35.
âIsamu Noguchi and Jaipurâs Jantar Mantarâ, Hannah Barry Gallery, London, 2016 (contribution to a book on Mohammed Qasim Ashfaq), 2016.
â âDes ciels gris de crystalâ. Mots pour Christoph von Weyheâ, in Donatien Grau (ed.), Christoph von Weyhe. Au silence, Association Azzedine AlaĂŻa/Actes Sud, Paris/Arles, 2016, pp. 49-57.
âThe In-Coming Passengersâ (on artist Desmond Lazaro), in Desmond Lazaro, The In-Coming Passengers, Chemould Gallery, Mumbai, 2016.
âEbrahim Alkazi and Exhibition-Making: Revisiting the Post-Independence Indian Art Sceneâ, in Parul Dave Mukherji (ed.), Directing Art: A Tribute to Ebrahim Alkazi, Mapin, Ahmedabad, 2016, pp. 152-167.
âLearning from Chandigarh: Architecture and Photographyâ, in Shanay Jhaveri (ed.), Chandigarh is in India, The Shoestring Publisher, Mumbai, 2016, pp. 232-240 & pp. 273-281.
âZarina’s Folding House’, in Zarina: Folding House, Gallery Espace, New Delhi, 2014.
âIndian Nationalist Art History and the Writing and Exhibiting of Mughal Art, 1910-1948â, Art History, volume 36, issue 5, 2013, pp. 1042-1069.
âApproaching the Mughal Past in Indian Art Criticism: The Case of MARG (1946-1963)â, Modern Asian Studies, volume 47, issue 1, 2013, pp. 167-203.
âA Modern Formation? Circulating International Art in India, 1950s-1970sâ, in Shanay Jhaveri (ed.), Western Artists and India: Creative Inspirations in Art and Design, Thames and Hudson, London, and The Shoestring Publisher, Mumbai, 2013, pp. 46-57.
âA German Insider in Bombay Cinema: Franz Ostenâs Situated Orientalismâ, in Shanay Jhaveri (ed.), Memory and Representation, Cultuur Centrum Brugge, Bruges, 2012, pp. 28-33.
âContextualiser lâart contemporain indien. Une histoire des expositions de groupe de 1968 Ă nos joursâ, in Sophie Duplaix and Fabrice Bousteau (eds), Paris-Delhi-Bombay, Editions du Centre Pompidou, Paris, 2011, pp. 88-95.
âThe Compass that keeps on spinningâ (on artist Amar Kanwar), in Juan Guardiola (ed.) INDIA: Auteur films, independent documentaries and video art (1899-2008), La Casa Encendida, Madrid, 2009, pp. 168-175.
Other publications include:
‘Trajectory of Thoughts’ (review of Geeta Kapur, Speech Acts), MARG, December 2025, pp. 135-136; contributions to Foreigners Everywhere. Catalogue of the 60th International Art Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia, Venice, 2024; ‘Foregrounding Global Narratives’ (review of Monica Juneja, Can Art History be made Global?), Texte zur Kunst, June 2024, pp. 192-197; ‘Un appel Ă la raison’, in Patrick Bouchain (ed.), Pierre Guyotat. La parole visible, Association Pierre Guyotat and Diaphanes, Paris, 2024, pp. 140-141; ‘Avant-Garde and Liberation. Zeitgenössische Kunst und dekoloniale Moderne, Springerin, issue 4, 2024;Ìę‘Connecting South Asian Modernities’, TAKE on Art, March 2024, pp. 36-39; ‘Radhika Khimji: Cutting into Space’, Experimenter 2023, Experimenter, Kolkata, 2024; ‘Conversation entre Manish Pushkale et Devika Singh’, in Claire Betinelli (ed.), To whom the bird should speak? Carte blanche Ă Manish Pushkale (at the MusĂ©e Guimet), Mapin, Ahmedabad, 2024; contribution to Mortimer Chatterjee (ed.), Moving Focus, India: New Perspectives on Modern and Contemporary Art (The Shoestring Publisher, Mumbai, 2022) pp. 504-505; âZarina: A Tributeâ, Critical Collective (online, 2020: https://criticalcollective.in/ArtistInner2.aspx?Aid=135&Eid=1340); contribution to Donatien Grau and Christoph Wiesner (eds), After the Crisis: Contemporary States of Photography (Diaphanes, 2019); contribution to âDecolonial Documentsâ (frieze, online, 2018 : https://www.frieze.com/article/decolonial-documents-part-three); Review of India: Contemporary Photographic and New Media Art, Critique dâArt, 2018; âHera BĂŒyĂŒktaĆcıyan, âDeconstructorsââ, TAKE on Art, January-June 2018, pp. 44-47; âNalini Malani : âIf humankind wants to survive the twenty-first centuryââ, Art Press, no. 450, December 2017, pp. 49-54; contribution to Paris Photo, 1997-2016. Parcours (Paris Photo, 2016), pp. 92-93; âFour literary showsâ, frieze, October 2016, pp. 238-239; âInheriting the transnational history of art reviewsâ, TAKE on art, July-December 2016, pp. 32-35; âFarah Atassiâ, frieze, September 2016, pp. 182-183 ; âMade in Algeria. GĂ©nĂ©alogie dâun territoireâ, Art Press, January 2016, pp. 8-11; ‘Mrinalini Mukherjee’, frieze, April 2015, pp. 152-153; âSheela Gowdaâ, Art Press, May 2014, p. 18; âZarinaâ, frieze, June-August 2013, p. 235; âDelhi City Reportâ, frieze, no. 148, June-August 2012, pp. 142-149; âAmar Kanwar. La juste mesure du documentaireâ, Art Press, no. 379, June 2011, pp. 42-46; âRanjani Shettarâ, June-August 2011, frieze, p. 205; âLooking back at the influential Summer of 1977â (interview with Vasif Kortun), ArtAsiaPacific, March and April 2010, pp. 62-63; âBeing Singular Plural: Moving Images from Indiaâ, Art Press, November 2010, p. 98; âTsuruko Yamazaki: Beyond Gutaiâ, ArtAsiaPacific, July-August 2010, p. 124; âChristian Boltanskiâ, frieze, May 2010, pp. 136-137; âResemble Reassembleâ, Art Press, April 2010, pp. 78-79; âIndian Highwayâ, frieze, March 2009, p 148-149; âLooking Back/Looking Forwardâ (best of 2008), frieze, January-February 2009, pp. 96-115; âStill Moving Imageâ, frieze, November-December 2008, p. 209; âFire in the Belly: The Poetics of Ranjani Shettarâ, ArtAsiaPacific, November-December 2007, pp. 144-149; ‘Made in India’, Art India, vol. X, issue IV, 2005, pp. 86-87.
Modern Art and Museums panel, Art Dubai 2023 (with Karina El Helou, Nathalie Bondil and Nada Shabout, moderated by Ridha Moumni and introduced by Lorenzo Giusti)
Towards a Transnational Approach to American Art: Isamu Noguchi in India and Beyond, Terra Foundation for American Art, online, 2021 (with Katy Siegel, convened by Elisa Schaar)
L'Avenir des musées. Conversation conçue et animée par Donatien Grau, Festival aprÚs, demain, Théùtre du Chùtelet, Paris, 2020 (with Sébastien Allard and Caroline Bourgeois, introduced by Ruth MacKenzie)
Postwar: Art between the Pacific and the Atlantic, 1945-65 conference, Haus der Kunst, Munich, 2014