Born in Calcutta, Nikhil Biswas emerged as a deeply committed artist whose practice was shaped as much by collective action as by individual expression. A tireless art activist, he played a formative role in the establishment of key artistic collectives such as the Calcutta Painters Group, the Chitrangshu Group, and the Society of Contemporary Artists, Calcutta. Through these initiatives, Biswas sought to build a shared artistic language that responded directly to the social and political realities of his time.

Trained at the Government College of Arts and Crafts, Calcutta, where he received his diploma in 1954, Biswas developed his practice during a period when abstraction dominated the Indian art scene. Yet, rather than follow prevailing trends, he remained committed to a humanist approach, foregrounding the lived experiences of individuals caught within broader historical forces. His work consistently reflected a concern for ethical and emotional engagement over formal experimentation alone.

Alongside his artistic practice, Biswas worked as an illustrator for Bengali weeklies such as Darpan and Janasebak Saptahik, using the printed image as a means to confront contemporary political unrest and social upheaval. To sustain himself, he also taught art at the Mitra Institute, a government school, balancing pedagogy with creative pursuit.

Much of Biswas’s artistic output emerged from personal diaries, which became a vital site of visual exploration. His stark black-and-white drawings feature recurring motifs, clowns, soldiers, horses, and women, rendered through dense ink and expressive linework. Though his life was brief, Biswas produced a powerful and extensive body of work, later exhibited posthumously in Germany and now held in the permanent collection of the Halle Museum, Dresden.