'Partha Mitter's lucid and well-illustrated The Triumph of Modernism explores Indian artists' encounter with the avant-garde from 1922 to 1947. It gives due prominence to pioneers: above all, Amrita Sher-Gil, the Sikh-Hungarian prodigy and firebrand.' - The Independent 'Contemporary critical arguments and critical context, as well as political melodrama, enliven the text. The colour illustrations are stunning.' ... Read more- The Art Book 'A sumptuously illustrated exploratory guide to India's artists and the avant garde movement of 1922-1947' - Yoga and Health 'With this book Partha Mitter adds further to his already monumental contribution to the study of Indian art. A comprehensive survey of ideas, institutions and schools, it is rich in details that leap out of obscurity to illuminate the significance of the whole. What emerges is a fascinating pattern of contradictions and coalescences that make up the stuff called modernism. There's nothing simple about this tissue of paradoxes which constitutes the originality of the phenomenon in its subcontinental habitat. By undertaking to describe and analyze its complexities, this book earns its place in the corpus of distinguished critical literature that warns us against an overtly Eurocentric view of modernity, an alarm already sounded in the author's celebrated work, Much Maligned Monsters (1977). Furthermore, it alerts all concerned to the indifference that allows South Asian historiography to remain blissfully unaware of what it can and must learn from contemporary writings on the history of art. There is a great deal here for all narratives of colonialism and modernism to feed on.' - Ranajit Guha, founder of Subaltern Studies Show Less