The Magic of Making

Forthcoming in India in April 2024.

Essays on the evolving aesthetics of a globalized, rapidly changing world.

K. G. Subramanyan (1924–2016) played a pivotal role in shaping India’s artistic identity after Independence. Mani-da, as he was fondly called, seamlessly blended elements of modernism with folk expression in his works, spanning paintings, murals, sculptures, prints, set designs and toys. Beyond his visual artistry, his writings have laid a solid foundation for understanding the demands of art on the individual. In the year of his centenary, Seagull is proud to publish his writings in special new editions.

In this collection of essays, written over 25 years, K. G. Subramanyan expresses his concerns with a wide range of issues—art, aesthetics, visual perception and creativity; the importance of craft practice and its nurturing; the role and future of old traditions and cultural institutions in the contemporary world; the detrimental effects of the Industrial Revolution and high-technology societies; the constant depletion of the environment; our nation’s inability to cope with the education and employment of its divergent multitudes; and the present-day scenes in art, education and society.

Acknowledging that globalization is an essential and inevitable feature of modern civilization with its inbuilt impulsions, Subramanyan emphasizes that an intelligent human being must negotiate them with insight and vigilance to ensure a space for herself (and for the community she has intimate ties with) to grow towards greater fulfilment. In turns questioning, critical, forewarning and instructive, these essays draw from the artist’s own observations, readings, experiences and insights as artist, adviser, teacher, student and citizen of a world fast losing sight of its roots.