'This publication arises from a lecture delivered at the National Institute of Education (Nanyang Technical University) in which aspects of the academic landscape in Singapore and elsewhere are scanned. The interest is in the teaching of the history of art in the then University of Malaya in the 1950s and its advancement in the 1960s. Through lectures and exhibitions convened in an art museum established on the university premises, the discipline of art history was integral to academe and a formative locus in Singapore's cultural sphere. In 1972 the facilities where closed and the history of art as a domain for advancing knowledge effectively ceased to exist.' - extracted from the front flap

Art historian T.K. Sabapathy gives a personal account which traces the inauguration of the history of art in the university, its development with the appointments of Michael Sullivan and William Willetts, and its impact on advancing scholarship on Southeast Asian art. It is also interwoven with wider movements in academia, the world and his life.