Introduction: Into the thick of things -- On universals, myth, and morphogenesis -- Playing balls with Matisse, Picasso, and Himid -- Sexing the modern with Manet, Morimura, and Sam Taylor-Wood -- The devil's interval : Barbara Hepworth, Anish Kapoor, and Liz Larner -- A valediction : nationalism and melancholia; sex, war, and modernism.