Diego Singh’s works are composed of layers of paint often developed over the span of years. Intricately woven strands and washes of oil and acrylic paint are applied with a diverse range of methods and tools, such as rubbing pigment directly onto canvas, utilizing craft brushes with conjoined bristles to achieve delicate striations, and spraying paint with make-up airbrush guns to create dense, yet diffused, lines of color. The queer make-up of Singh’s paintings resist readability on a surface level, and instead builds a layered language that supports a dissenting stance against the confines of stratified and oppressive legacies.

Following an ‘ad-lib approach to painting;’ Singh addresses the medium intuitively, emphasizing its capacity to open itself into ambiguity. As ICA Miami curator Stephanie Seidel writes, Singh’s handling of paint results in masses of color and form “obscured…to the point of becoming impenetrable.”

Apparitions and silhouettes frequently emerge from the veils and latticework of mark and gesture; rendered in a loose and undefined outline, the identities of these figures are indiscernible. They appear to be made of light – powerful, phosphorescent, yet ephemeral. The process of Singh’s paint application is concealed and selectively revealed layer upon layer, creating a push and pull between disappearance and visibility, abstraction and figuration. For Singh, this visual language captures a queer experience of obscuring and exposing elements of the self, emphasizing painting’s capacity to remain in a state of political and poetic tension, invention, and indeterminacy.

Diego Singh (b. 1982, Salta, Argentina) has exhibited his work at the ICA Miami, FL; Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego, CA; Pérez Art Museum Miami, FL; Fondazione Malvina Menegaz, Castelbasso, Italy; Braverman Gallery, Tel-Aviv, Israel; Mendes Wood DM, São Paulo, Brazil; Palazzo Fruscione, Salerno, Italy; Tomio Koyama Gallery, Tokyo, Japan; Fredric Snitzer Gallery, Miami, FL; Various Small Fires, Los Angeles, CA; and the Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami, FL, among others. Singh was awarded the Knight Foundation award in 2019 and 2015. He lives and works in Miami Beach, FL.