Writing the Modern: Selected Texts on Art & Art History in Singapore, Malaysia & Southeast Asia

T.K. Sabapathy has been writing on the art of Southeast Asia for over four decades (1973–2015), as a critic, curator and art historian. This collection of his work, representing the scope and depth of Sabapathy’s output, and highlighting his most important and influential writings, is also a survey of the vast changes in the landscape of art in the region over the period.

A historian and educator, penetrating critic and ardent advocate, Sabapathy’s early scholarly engagements were marked by clear commitments to the art historiography of the Hindu-Buddhist traditions of Southeast Asia. He later emerged as an eloquent proponent of modern and contemporary Southeast Asian art. His art historical methods, critical documentation, deep dialogue with artists and detailed explication of their works have helped define Singapore and Malaysian art. His extensive studies of Southeast Asian art and artists have helped set the course of art discourse in the region.

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.

“a remarkably rigourous and empathetic thinker...Sabapathy demonstrates an acute sensitivity to the visual, tactile, and symbolic qualities of artistic mediums.” - Greg Galligan, Art in America

“Reading this anthology is a revelation, like encountering a Chinua Achebe novel… Writing the Modern is a seminal publication on art practices in the region, articulated through the voice of a formidable scholar and intellectual.” - Peter Yeoh, The Mekong Review

“In the vast firmament of Singaporean-Malaysian art history, no star illuminates as radiantly as T.K. Sabapathy... The breath, depth and range of his scholarship are indeed staggering.” - Carmen Nge, Arts Equator