Amrita Sher-Gil was born in Budapest in 1913. Her mother was Hungarian and her father was from a noble Sikh family. The family lived in Hungary, India and Italy at various points. From an early age, Amrita showed artistic promise and, at the urgings of her teachers, the family moved from India to Paris when Amrita was 16. There, she enrolled in the École des Beaux-Arts and threw herself into the artistic life of the city, experimenting sexually with both men and women and developing her art. In 1932, her painting Young Girls won the Gold Medal from the Grand Salon.

Yet after six years in Paris, she decided to return to India, feeling that her destiny as a painter lay there. Settling in Simla, she set about learning about her country. In 1937, she had her first major exhibition in Lahore, which attracted the attention and praise of numerous art critics. She also met the nationalist leader Jawharlalal Nehru, with whom she developed a close friendship. The journalist Malcolm Muggeridge was another of her lovers. In an attempt to gain some emotional stability, she decided to marry her cousin Victor Egan, returning to Hungary only to journey back to India at the outbreak of World War II. Life in India was mixed. Victor, a doctor, struggled to find meaningful work and Amrita had long unproductive spells. In 1942 they moved to Lahore and Amrita prepared optimistically for another major exhibition, but she died suddenly from peritonitis.

Styled as India’s Frida Kahlo, Amrita’s influence on modern Indian art has been disproportionate to her short yet full life. This book is a fascinating study of her time and the place of her work in Indian and European culture.

Mark Rubbo