Ranbir Singh Kaleka was born in Patiala, Punjab, in 1953. He studied painting at the College of Art, Punjab University in Chandigarh, and subsequently took on a teaching assignment at the Punjabi University and College of Art in New Delhi. He later obtained his Master’s degree in painting from the Royal College of Art in London.

The artist’s work has been widely exhibited in India and abroad. His most recent solo and group shows include the 4th Guangzhou Triennial, 2011; MediaArtLab in Moscow, in 2011; Prague Biennale 5, in 2011, Lalit Kala Akademi’s ‘Tolstoy Farm- Archive of Utopia’, in 2011; ‘Contemporary Masterpieces from Private Collections’ at Singapore Art Museum, in 2011; ‘Finding India, Art for the New Century’ at MOCA Taipei, in 2010; Hong Kong Art Fair, in 2010; ‘Sweet Unease’ at Volte Gallery, Mumbai, in 2010; ‘Reading Man’, in 2009, and ‘Fables from the House of Ibaan: Stage I’ in 2008, at Bose Pacia Gallery, New York; Chalo India at the Mori Art Museum, Tokyo, in 2008; a multi-media installation commissioned to the permanent collection of the Spertus Museum, Chicago, in 2007; the Sydney Biennale, 2008; Urban Manners at Hangar Bicocca, Milan, in 2007; New Narratives: Contemporary Art from India at the Chicago Cultural Center in 2007; Horn Please: The Narrative in Contemporary Indian Art at the Museum of Fine Arts, Berne, in 2007; Art Video Lounge at Art Basel Miami Beach, Miami, in 2006; Hungry God: Indian Contemporary Art at Busan Museum of Modern Art, South Korea in 2006; iCon: India Contemporary at the Venice Biennale, 2005; Edge of Desire: Recent Art in India at the Asia Society, New York, in 2005; Culturgest-Lisbon in 2004; Zoom! Art in Contemporary India, Lisbon, in 2004; and subTerrain: Indian Contemporary Art at the House of World Culture, Berlin, in 2003. 

Ranbir Kaleka lives and works in New Delhi.