Krishna Reddy was born on 15 July 1925, in a small village called Nandanoor, near Chittoor, Andhra Pradesh, in India.[4][5] His father was an agricultural worker, who also painted murals in temples.[6]
Reddy studied at Visva-Bharati University's Kala Bhavana (Institute of Fine Arts) with Nandalal Bose, from 1941 to 1946, and graduated with a degree in fine arts.[3][4] From 1947 to 1949, he was head of the art section at Kalakshetra Foundation and was also teaching art at the Montessori Teachers' Training Centre in Madras.[4] It was at this time that he took interest in sculpture and painting.[4]
Reddy was considered a master in intaglio printmaking and after 1965 was an associate director at Hayter's Atelier 17.[8] Atelier 17, a thriving artist workshop was founded in 1927 by Hayter and was originally located in Paris; however between 1939 and 1940 the workshop moved to New York City and in 1950 back to Paris.[9] Atelier 17 has always been a meeting place to experiment with their art practices for both European and American artists including Joan Miró, Pablo Picasso, Alberto Giacometti, Juan Cardenas, Constantin Brâncuși, and Zarina Hashmi.[3]
Reddy's technique and style distinguished him as an important printmaker. Reddy's prints are abstract, created with subtle grid-like designs on plates with intricate texturisations. The myriad complex colours that he introduced in prints are marked by a contemplative approach to the infinite mysteries of nature.[10] While working at Atelier 17, Reddy was instrumental in developing a new printing process to produce multi-coloured prints from a single printing matrix by exploiting the viscosity and tackiness of the inks, subsequently named viscosity printing.[11][12] Reddy would later teach the viscosity etching technique at Robert Blackburn (artist)'s Printmaking Workshop in New York.[13]
Reddy received the Padma Shri award in 1972, in recognition of his distinguished contributions to art.[14]