The Magic of Making: Essays on Art and Culture

In this collection of essays, written over the last 25 years, veteran artist K.G. Subramanyan express 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 himself (and for the community he has intimate ties with) to grow towards greater fulfillment. These essays are full of Subramanyan’s personal observations, readings, experiences and insights as artist, adviser, teacher, student and citizen of a world fast losing sight of its roots as it struggles to keep up with the relentless pace of progress set by other worlds and other choices.