Aryan Arora (b. 1999, Saharanpur, India) is a Singapore-based multidisciplinary visual and performance artist. He holds a BA (Hons) in Fine Arts from LASALLE College of the Arts, Singapore, awarded by Goldsmiths, University of London. Recognized by Republic World as one of the Visionary Personalities of 2026 and recipient of the People’s Choice Award 2025 at INSTINC Space’s 60/60: Singapore in Focus exhibition, Arora’s practice incisively explores identity, societal norms, memory, and the interplay between past and present through personal and collective lenses.

His work challenges entrenched taboos and cultural expectations by giving voice to overlooked narratives within contemporary society. Translating his unique perspective as a color-blind artist, Arora bypasses conventional chromatic reliance, instead anchoring his practice in a distinctive monochromatic and tonal palette. Through high-contrast oil application and a striking use of latex-textured, faceless figures, he constructs a symbolic visual language that interrogates the dualities of human experience —presence and absence, vulnerability and concealment, tradition and progress. These abstracted, mask-like forms evoke the blurred boundaries between what endures and what fades, inviting viewers to reflect on authentic selfhood beneath performative facades.

Arora’s work has been exhibited at institutions and venues including the Institute of Contemporary Arts Singapore, Visual Arts Centre Singapore, INSTINC Art Space, The Substation Gallery, Art Dubai, Google Headquarters Singapore, and Mumbai International Airport. He is currently preparing to expand his international footprint with upcoming debut exhibitions in the UK and Europe.

Can you tell us about your background and how you started your artistic journey?

I come from a small town in India called Saharanpur, but my artistic journey really began at Welham Boys’ School, a boarding school where I first picked up a paintbrush. Early on, I realized art was my truest language. I painted the things I couldn’t articulate in words. It was simply easier, and far more honest, to paint it out. A high school exchange program to Australia sealed my conviction: I knew this wasn’t just a hobby, but my life’s path.

Coming from a background where no one viewed fine art as a viable career, taking the road less traveled was a leap into the unknown, but it brought me to Singapore to pursue Fine Arts at LASALLE College of the Arts. I arrived expecting LASALLE to simply teach me how
to paint; instead, it completely reconstructed my mind. It didn’t just teach me technique. It taught me how to think, to observe the unobserved, and to question everything. After experimenting with public murals, performance art, and visual storytelling, painting ultimately chose me. I found my true anchor on the canvas, creating a direct and fluid channel to reach people and communicate the unfiltered truths of who I am.

How do you stay inspired and motivated to create new work?

First and foremost, creating art is a true privilege. Being able to step into my studio in Singapore every single day without fail and just create is a blessing I never take for granted.

My inspiration comes from observing what people try to hide. As an Indian expat living in Singapore, I am constantly drawn to themes of memory, identity, and the masks we wear. Living between cultures forces you to question what identity truly is. I am deeply fascinated by human psychology, vice, and the stark contrast between the faces we present to the world versus who we are behind closed doors. I have started seeing humans as reflective, monotonous beings constantly changing masks. We all play parts and wear whatever skin we are supposed to wear at a given moment. Right now, I am wearing the mask of an artist giving an interview. After this, I will wear the mask of a friend, an employee, or a son. We perform the roles required of us, and that psychological performance is precisely what I aim to capture.

Motivation for me is born out of constant observation. I want to notice the unnoticed and reveal the hidden layers of identity that surface only when nobody is looking. Bringing those quiet moments of human vulnerability to light through my eyes is what drives me to paint every day.

How has your artistic style evolved over time?

My evolution began with an unexpected revelation. Being colour blind, hyperrealism was initially unsettling. I used Pantone shade cards just to map where specific colours belonged on canvas. My lecturer at LASALLE changed everything by pointing out that colour blindness was not a limitation, but a unique lens to see the world differently.

That realization sparked my move into monochromatic work. My first solo show in Singapore, Silent Dialogues, featured stark black and white canvases with a liquid latex sheen. Around that time, I explored performance art, including Monotonic Symphonies, where I covered myself in charcoal to leave raw footprints and handprints on the space. Later, I body painted eight figures in black paint, giving them a second skin. That experiment revealed how humans wear masks and perform roles. Stripping away colour became magical. When painting an apple tree, traditional artists use red, green, and brown. By confining myself to black and white, I discovered hundreds of hidden shades within a single palette that could portray far deeper emotion than full colour ever could.

Now, as I prepare for my UK debut solo exhibition, PRUSSIAN SPIT, at Shug Gallery from 9 October to 25 October, my style is evolving once more. For the first time, I am introducing colour into my work, yet retaining my monochromatic discipline by using only Prussian blue. The canvases look glazed in raw blue layers. My process has also slowed down dramatically. Painting in oil on linen canvas for the first time, each work takes months to build layer by layer. I used to paint fast, but now I listen to the canvas. I strongly believe that canvas has memory, holding every stroke beneath the surface. With each layer, I gain greater clarity.

Are there any particular mediums you prefer working with? Why?

My primary medium of choice is oil paint. I love working with oil for the simple reason that it stays wet for a long time, allowing me to return to the canvas and build up translucent layers over time. Recently, I have also started working on raw linen canvas, and I am really loving the unique friction and texture it offers under the brush.

As a trained painter, I know oil paint is naturally designed to blend seamlessly. However, I enjoy challenging myself by intentionally breaking that rule. I purposefully do not let my purest blacks and whites blend into each other on the canvas. Instead, I blend only the grey transitional areas in between. Balancing where to blend pigment and where to leave raw separation is how I achieve the slick sheen and latex shiny glow in my work. Building up thin glazes of oil paint allows me to manipulate light across the canvas until the surface feels liquid, reflective, and completely alive.

What challenges have you faced as an artist, and how have you overcome them?

The greatest challenge in an artistic career is maintaining complete vulnerability in a world where everyone has an opinion. Pursuing fine art professionally means stepping off a cliff without a safety net, transforming a personal practice into a daily commitment to face the unknown.

To create every single day, you have to fight against the distraction of external validation. It is tempting to wonder if an artwork will be picked by a gallery or how it will be received by critics. Overcoming this means learning to isolate yourself with the blank canvas. I paint to channel genuine emotion, often spending months building hidden layers into a piece that viewers might not even explicitly catch.

Releasing artwork into the world requires letting go. Once a painting is public, it belongs to the viewers to judge, experience, and interpret through their own eyes. The challenge, and the ultimate victory, is tuning out all commentary during the painting process so the work remains entirely honest.

What do you hope people take away from your art when they experience it?

When someone walks into my exhibition space, my ultimate goal is to ignite emotion. I want people to pause, reflect, question, and look at the split side of the coin. I want viewers to interpret the paintings through their own lens and walk away with a fresh chain of thought. What keeps me going as an artist is questioning the world, endlessly diving into the whys of human existence. If my art can simply offer people another why to think about, then the work has fulfilled its purpose.

Text and photo courtesy of Aryan Arora

Website: https://www.aryanarora.art
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/aryanaroraart/