The Spirit of Indian Painting Book Close Encounters with 101 Great Works 1100–1900 - Thames & Hudson

In this beautifully illustrated and richly detailed book, renowned art historian B. N. Goswamy opens readers' eyes to the wonders of Indian painting and presents new ways of viewing art. The enlightening introductory essay, “A Layered World,” explains the themes and emotions that inspired Indian painters, the values and influences that shaped their work, and the unique ways they depicted time and space. It also describes various regional styles, relationships between patrons and painters, tools and techniques used by artists, and the environment in which they created their works. The second part of the book, “Close Encounters with 101 Great Works,” features carefully selected images by Professor Goswamy, spanning nearly a thousand years—from Jain manuscripts and Rajasthani miniatures, Mughal, Pahari, and Deccani paintings, to Company School artworks. His descriptions and analyses unlock the treasures within these works and show us how to “read” each image, highlighting its finest features, explaining visual vocabulary and symbolism, and narrating the story, legend, or event that inspired it.

Combining deep scholarship with great storytelling, this is a book of lasting value that educates and delights the reader. It is destined to become a classic.

The Thames & Hudson brand was founded in 1949 by Walter and Eva Neurath. Their greatest passion and mission was to create a “museum without walls” and to make the world of art and leading scholarly research accessible to a broad audience. To reflect international perspectives, the company’s name combines the rivers flowing through London and New York, represented in its logo by two dolphins symbolizing friendship and intelligence, one facing east and the other west, suggesting a connection between the Old World and the New.

Today, still an independent, family-owned company, Thames & Hudson is one of the world’s leading publishers of illustrated books, with over 2,000 titles in print. It publishes high-quality books across all areas of visual creativity: fine arts, applied arts, decorative arts, performing arts, architecture, design, photography, fashion, film, and music, as well as archaeology, history, and popular culture. The list of children’s books is also expanding. Headquartered in London with a sister company in New York and branches in Melbourne, Singapore, and Hong Kong. In Paris, another subsidiary, Interart, distributes English-language books in France.

History of Thames & Hudson

Walter Neurath was born in Vienna in 1903. In 1938, he left his hometown—where he ran an art gallery and published illustrated books—for London. Initially, he worked as production director at Adprint, a company founded by Viennese émigré Wolfgang Foges. Neurath and Foges developed a pioneering concept now known as book packaging (or co-publishing), where book ideas are developed, commissioned, produced, and sold to publishers operating in different markets and languages, enabling large print runs and reducing unit production costs. Neurath’s concept was the first of many innovations introduced to the publishing world through Thames & Hudson.

Seeking to continue book packaging in a second edition and recognizing the need to amortize the high costs of producing illustrated books, Neurath founded his own publishing company with offices in London and New York in autumn 1949. Eva Neurath, who arrived in London from Berlin in 1939, was a co-founder.

Of the ten titles published on Thames & Hudson's first list in 1950, *English Cathedrals*, with photographs by Martin Hürlimann, was the first and achieved the greatest success. The company's strong conviction from the very beginning regarding the longevity of books remained in print until 1971. In the first year of publication, *Out of My Later Years* by Albert Einstein also appeared, an early indicator of the program's breadth. As the list gradually and successfully expanded—from ten titles in 1950 to 144 in 1955—the company moved its offices to High Holborn and in 1956 relocated to a Georgian townhouse at 30 Bloomsbury Street, near Bedford Square, becoming the epicenter of book publishing in London. The manufacturing remained at this address, eventually expanding to five houses by 1999, when it returned to High Holborn.

In 1958, Thames & Hudson launched one of its most renowned series, *World of Art*, which became the foundation of a highly diverse list. Characterized by pocket-sized editions and black spines, the series expanded in just seven years to include 49 titles. Nearly 60 years later, the series boasts over 300 titles, which, according to Christopher Frayling, are “splashed with paint copies” in every art school across the country.

Other significant series that added depth and prestige to the list include *Ancient People and Places*, edited by Glyn Daniel, who from the 1950s contributed to pioneering interest in archaeology, both in book form and television. Over 34 titles have been published in this series over 34 years. The large-format *Great Civilizations* series, launched in 1961, featured contributions from esteemed scholars such as Alan Bullock, Asa Briggs, Hugh Trevor-Roper, A. J. P. Taylor, and John Julius Norwich.
After establishing one of the most important publishing houses in Europe in less than two decades, Walter Neurath died in 1967 at the age of 63. Sculptor Henry Moore wrote that “his death was a loss to our cultural life.” Sir Herbert Read noted that Neurath “more than anyone else was responsible for the revolution in publishing art books” and was “one of those rare entrepreneurs who successfully combine business acumen with idealism.” Eva Neurath became chairwoman. Walter’s son, Thomas, who joined the company in 1961 along with his sister Constance, became managing director; Constance later served as artistic director for several decades. Both Thomas and Constance remain on the Thames & Hudson board, as do Thomas’s daughters, Johanna and Susanna.

From producing the first commercial edition of *The Book of Kells* to the triumphant publication of the six-volume *Vincent van Gogh - Letters*, from technical innovations like “French folds” to the controversial documentation of graffiti art in *Subway Art*, Thames & Hudson has always been at the forefront, both culturally and in production techniques.

The year 2016 marked an extraordinary new chapter for the company, announcing publishing partnerships with two of the world's leading museums: the British Museum and the Victoria and Albert Museum.

Art and scholarship thus remain at the heart of Thames & Hudson’s publishing program, which remains faithful to its core principle: providing a “museum without walls.”
Today, Thames & Hudson is a recognizable international brand, a symbol of British publishing. Its extensive catalog includes thousands of original book titles, many of which are elite collector’s editions.

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