This anthology of eminent Singaporean
art historian T.K. Sabapathy’s texts, selected from over four decades (1973 –
2015) of art critical and historical texts, brings together, for the first
time, a cogent selection of the most important and influential writings of one
of the region’s foremost art historians, selected to represent the scope and
depth of Sabapathy’s work. From the early 1970s, T.K. Sabapathy has been a tireless historian and educator, penetrating critic and ardent advocate and advisor of
the visual arts and culture, and his vast output has been foundational in the building
of the modern and contemporary art history of Southeast Asia. This publication
provides an opportunity for more focused (re)reading, review and renewed consideration
of T.K. Sabapathy’s rich body of work, to further fuel modern and contemporary
art writing, research and exhibition-making.
For many artists, curators,
writers and art institutions in Southeast Asia, Sabapathy has been and
continues to be a leading and an inspiring thinker, mentor and interlocutor. Writing the Modern will long serve as an
index to the future mappings of the art histories of the region.
Writing the Modern brings
together 57 texts of varying forms and lengths – from exhibition reviews,
catalogue essays, artist interviews, conference papers, speeches, lectures,
extracts of monographic studies, personal correspondence – organised within four thematic sections, each
preceded by editorial overviews:
Section
1: ‘The Southeast Asian Artist in Relation to Art History,’ edited with
overview by Joyce Toh;
Section 2: ‘A
Mind for Method, and an Eye for Medium, Material and Form,’ edited with overview by
Susie Lingham;
Section 3: ‘Art
Institutions and the Exhibition,’ edited with overview by Peter Schoppert;
Section 4:
‘Regional Perspectives on Southeast Asian Art,’ edited with overview by Ahmad
Mashadi.
