Chintan Upadhyay

Chintan Upadhyay (born 1972) is a contemporary Indian visual artist known for hismultidisciplinary practice across painting, sculpture, installation, and socially engaged art. His work frequently explores identity politics, consumer culture, and reproductive technology. He is particularly recognised for his "Designer Baby" series-sculptural forms that reflect on commodification and gender dynamics—which have been widely exhibited and featured in Sotheby's South Asian art auctions, including a 2007 sale in New York.

In 2002, Upadhyay co-founded Sandarbh, a non-profit Contemporary Arts initiative based in Partapur ( a small Village), Rajasthan, designed to bring contemporary art practices intopublic and marginalized spaces. Sandarbh has been recognized in curatorial literature for its role in expanding the scope of site-specific and socially engaged art in India.

In October 2023, a Mumbai sessions court convicted him for criminal conspiracy and abetment in the murder of his estranged wife, Hema Upadhyay. He was acquitted in the related death of her lawyer, Harish Bhambhani, after the court found no direct evidence linking him to that killing and concluded Bhambhani was "in the wrong place at the wrong time." The Supreme Court of India later suspended his sentence and granted bail in September 2024, noting that the case was based solely on circumstantial evidence and there was no allegation of direct involvement in the act.

He began his art career as a painter, but later created sculptures and installations. His best known sculpture project is perhaps the Pet Shop project, which is an ongoing production of a "model baby" for every season, Baby Fetish.

He was awarded the Charles Wallace Foundation Award for Residency in Bristol, UK in 2012.