Membermahakapi

About My Library

"Every library should try to be complete on something, if it were only the history of pinheads" - Oliver Wendell Homes

"The building itself left my scepticism in shreds...insisting with absolute force on its sovereign authority, it simply obliterated the million counterfeits of it and glowingly filled, once and forever, the place in the mind previously occupied by its simulacra and this, finally, is why the Taj Mahal must be seen; to remind us that the world is real, that the sound is truer than the echo, the original more forceful than its image in a mirror. The beauty of beautiful things is still able, in these image-saturated times, to transcend initations. And the Taj Mahal is beyond the power of words to say it, a lovely thing, perhaps the loveliest of things." - Salman Rushdie

"Europe belongs to Picasso, Matisse and many others; India belongs only to me." - Amrita Sher-Gil

"Rajput art creates a magic world where all men are heroic, all women are beautiful and passionate and shy, beasts both wild and tame are the friends of man, and trees and flowers are conscious of the footsteps of the bridegroom as he passes by. This magic world is not unreal or fanciful, but a world of imagination and eternity, visible to all who do not refuse to see with the transfiguring eyes of love." - Ananda Kentish Coomaraswamy, 1916

"Ajab yeh karte hain tasvir mein kamaal, ustaadon ke hain ustaad Raja Deen Dayal," (In the art of photography, surpassing all, A master of masters is Raja Deen Dayal)
- Shaiyiri (couplet) composed by Mir Mehboob Ali Khan, the Sixth Nizam of Hyderabad, in honour of his court-appointed and favorite photographer, Lala Deen Dayal

I have been collecting books on India for over 20 years. My collection focuses on all areas of Indology, particularly the arts, architecture, photography, religion, music/dance, history, philosophy, science, medicine, and languages. My aim has been to build an essential reference collection in Indian Painting, starting from early wall/cave painting through contemporary Indian painters. My collection is particularly strong in the extant literature on miniature/court painting (Mughal, Rajput, Pahari, Deccani, and Company schools) as well as in the main reference works pertaining to landscapes and watercolours created by British artists in India. My library also includes items on early photography during the British Raj as court patronage transitioned from the canvas to the camera.
I also collect books on Buddhism and Hinduism.

About Me

"I have always imagined that Paradise will be a kind of library" - Jorge Luis Borges

I live in New York City and am a market researcher by profession. My area of interest is Indology with special interests in Indian Miniature Painting, Indian History (chiefly period between decline of the Mughal Empire and ascent of the British Empire), Buddhist and Hindu philosophy.

Location

New York City

Memberships

TinyCat

Currently Reading

Four Centuries of Rajput Painting: Mewar, Marwar and Dhundhar Indian Miniatures from the Collection of Isabelle and Vicky Ducrot by Vicky Ducrot

Member Connections

Friends

abaranska, Shazam001

Interesting Library

amyposter, MaartenRuijters, malinablue, Shazam001, Yiggy