Raghubir Singh (1942–1999) was a pioneer of color street photography who worked and published prolifically from the late 1960s until his death in 1999 at age 56. Born into an aristocratic family in Rajasthan, he lived in Hong Kong, Paris, London, and New York—but his eye was perpetually drawn back to his native India. Singh worked at the intersection of western modernism and traditional South Asian perspectives. He was influenced by the work of Henri Cartier-Bresson, whom he met in Jaipur in 1966.
He pioneered color photography at a time when it was unpopular in the west, using it to great advantage to show the vibrant intensity of the country’s culture, traditions, and religion. Today Singh’s portrait of India during pivotal decades of social and political change is considered unique and unmatched.
