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Front Cover

Back Cover

Old Stacks, New Leaves: The Arts of the Book in South Asia

Author:Sonal Khullar (editor)
ISBN:9789376540303
Binding:Paperback
Year:2027
Pages:328 with 129 colour illustrations
Size:18 x 26 cm
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About the Book
A deep dive into the visual forms, material contexts, social lives, and global circulations of books.

In the twenty-first century, debates on the future of books and print culture have intensified with the rise of digital technologies, and the contemporary art world has witnessed an explosion of interest in the book form. Amid this artistic and intellectual activity, there has been little scrutiny of book arts in South Asia and their particular ontologies, histories, and genealogies. This volume weaves together scholarly essays, original artistic projects, and works of creative nonfiction to trace a history of illustrated books in South Asia from 1100 CE to the present.

From Nepalese palm-leaf manuscripts and imperial Mughal albums to lithographed cookbooks and mimeographed magazines, contributors examine a diverse range of materials rarely, if ever, studied together. Thematically organized, the chapters stage a critical dialogue between artists and scholars, emphasizing the visual, material, aesthetic, and phenomenological dimensions of books. Against narratives of the death of books in a digital age, this volume argues for the book as a vital form and dynamic practice. Written in a lucid and lively style, it will be of interest to scholars, curators, artists, critics, students, museum visitors, and readers of contemporary comics and graphic novels.
About the Author
Sonal Khullar

Sonal Khullar is W. Norman Brown Associate Professor of South Asian Studies in the Department of the History of Art at the University of Pennsylvania. She specializes in the art of South Asia from the eighteenth century onward, with particular interests in modern and contemporary art, cosmopolitanism, postcolonial art worlds, and critical historiographies of art. Worldly Affiliations received the Bernard S. Cohn Book Prize of the Association for Asian Studies and the Millard Meiss Publication Award and Meiss/Mellon Author’s Book Award of the College Art Association. She is also the editor of Old Stacks, New Leaves: The Arts of the Book in South Asia.
Editorial Reviews



“Ingeniously reinvigorates the study of South Asia's lesser-known book arts, transforming the reader's experience into the rise and swell of artistic performance. . . . Old Stacks, New Leaves: The Arts of the Book in South Asia achieves a rare balance between historical analysis, contemporary theory, and material engagement, opening myriad pathways to the art book. Like a classical Indian music concert, the essays rise to moments of scholarly virtuosity, relax with lilting refrains of insight, and resolve into profound discoveries.”
CAA Reviews
“[An] exciting new publication. . . . The scholarship complicates common understandings of South Asian bookmaking, whose regional practice and access benefited from Indic, Western, Islamic, and cross-cultural influences in the last millennium. Regardless of readers’ existing knowledge about book histories, a compelling essay or an inspiring image will surely pique their interest.”
Hyperallergic
“[The chapters] come together to form an engaging discussion about the notion of the book, with perspectives and insights from contributors who might not otherwise have been included in a single volume.”
Burlington Magazine
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