India and the World: New Arcs of Knowledge - Program and Abstracts Transregional Academy November 24-30, 2019 Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai - Forum ...
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Transregional Academy
November 24–30, 2019 India and the World:
New Arcs of Knowledge
Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai
Program and Abstracts
Impressum Claudia Pfitzner, MA (Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices ), Jule Ulbricht, BA (Art Histories and Aes- thetic Practices), Vrinda Agrawal, MA (Tagore National Scholar, Government Museum and Art Gallery, Chandigarh) Corporate Design: Plural | Severin Wucher, Berlin Image: Shakuntala Kulkarni, Photo Performance, B/6 Saraswat Co-Op Building, Gamdevi, 2010-12. (c) Shakuntala Kulkarni and Chemould Prescott Road, photograph by Shivani Gupta © 2019 Forum Transregionale Studien
India and the World: New Arcs of Knowledge Transregional Academy November 24–30, 2019 Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai Venues Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya 159-161, Mahatma Gandhi Road, Kala Ghoda, Fort, Mumbai 400023, Maharashtra, India csmvsmumbai@gmail.com Jadunath Bhavan Museum and Resource Center/ Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta 10 Lake Terrace Kolkata 700029, West Bengal, India info@cssscal.org Dakshina Chitra Museum East Coast Road Muttukadu, Chennai Chengalpet District 600118, Tamil Nadu, India dakmcf@gmail.com Contact Prof. Dr. Nachiket Chanchani Associate Professor of South Asian Art and Visual Culture, Departments of the History of Art and Asian Languages and Cultures University of Michigan 855 S. University Avenue, Ann Arbor MI 48109, USA E-mail: nachiket@umich.edu Dr. Hannah Baader Academic Program Director Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices Forum Transregionale Studien Wallotstr. 14, 14193 Berlin, Germany E-mail: arthistories@trafo-berlin.de
Contents Concept Note ........................................................................... 4 Program (Table) ....................................................................... 5 Program (Detailed) ................................................................. 6 Participants and Projects .................................................... 11 Steering Committee .............................................................. 24 Guest Scholars ........................................................................ 27 Institutional Framework ....................................................... 31 Notes .......................................................................................... 32
Concept Note
India and the World: New Arcs of Knowledge
Transregional Academy
November 24–30, 2019
Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai
Studying the visual and material culture of Sciences Calcutta (Kolkata), Dakshina Chitra
the Indian subcontinent constitutes a gateway Museum (Chennai) and Chhatrapati Shivaji
toward understanding much of the intellectual Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya (Mumbai).
and cultural heritage of the globe, from antiquity The organizers acknowledge Prof. Dr. Tapati
to the present day. The assemblages of objects Guha-Thakurta's role in co-organizing the Kol-
and images produced and used in the subconti- kata segment of the Transregional Academy.
nent —Buddhist stupas, sprawling temple-cities,
Mughal carpets, Chettiyar homes, Satyajit Ray
The Transregional Academy will be led by the
films, bazaar paintings, family photographs and
following scholars:
much else—represent more than the inherit-
ance of the subcontinent. This Academy brings
Prof. Dr. Nachiket Chanchani
together artists, curators, and scholars who are
(University of Michigan, Ann Arbor)
critically investigating such objects and images,
and are interested in explicating how they are Dr. Hannah Baader
equally the heritage of many other cultures and (Art Histories and Aesthetic Practices, Berlin/
communities. Many of them have emerged from Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-
encounters with other mediums and with other Planck-Institut)
regions, which, in turn, have been reflected, Prof. Dr. Rosinka Chaudhuri
reshaped, and reformed by the art of subconti- (Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta)
nent.
Prof. Dr. Tapati Guha-Thakurta
The Transregional Academy will be held at (Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta)
Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Vastu Sangrahalaya Dr. Deborah Thiagarajan
in Mumbai, Centre for Studies in Social Sciences, (Dakshina Chitra Museum/ Madras Craft Foun-
Calcutta, and at Dakshina Chitra Museum in dation, Chennai)
Chennai in various formats including a sympo- Prof. Dr. Gerhard Wolf
sium where research papers will be presented,
(Kunsthistorisches Institut – Max-Planck-Insti-
site visits, experiential learning sessions, and
tut, Florenz)
discussions.
The Transregional Academy is organized by http://academies.hypotheses.org/
Prof. Dr. Nachiket Chanchani (University of www.forum-transregionale-studien.de
www.art-histories.de
Michigan, Ann Arbor) in collaboration with Art
www.khi.fi.it
Histories and Aesthetic Practices program at www.cssscal.org
the Forum Transregionale Studien (Berlin), Kun- www.csmvs.in
sthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck- www.dakshinachitra.net
Institut (Florence), Centre for Studies in Social
4Program (Table)
SAT, Nov 23 SAT. Nov 24 MON, Nov 25 TUE, Nov 26 WED, Nov 27 THU, Nov 28 FRI, Nov 29 SAT, Nov 30
Welcome at Panel 6
Welcome and CSSSC/ Workshop
R. Ghose
V. Gupta ‘Making Things in
Introduction Introduction of all South Asia’
P. Roy Choudhury Round Table
participants
Conversation
Travel to Panel 1 Travel to
‘The Indian House
Kolkata H. Baader Chennai as an Archive’
‘City as an N. Kimmet Panel 7 D. Thiagarajan
Archive’ walk J. Pal B. Kuriakose
R. Chaudhuri
S. Menon Final Discussion
through UNESCO Panel 2 S. Mitra R. Jafer
World Heritage S. Mallik W. Bamber
R. Bernhaut
P. Singh
A Lunch
R Tour of CSMVS
5
Panel 3 Panel 8
R galleries and
T. Guha-Thakurta P. Deshpande
special exhibition M. Sil S. Agarwal
I
N. Rizvi S. Bhatawadekar Walk through
V Dakshina Chitra
Discussion on the campus with
A
making of ‘India Visit to Victoria Panel 4 Panel 9 curators
L Memorial Hall N. Chanchani T. Banerjee
and the World’ End of
and grounds led M. Manohar J. Bachman Visit to
exhibition with by Academy/
P. Wibulsilp I. López Arnaiz Mahabalipuram
S. Mukherjee T. Guha-Thakurta Departure
Tea Break Tea Break Tea Break Tea Break
Conversation Panel 5 Tour of JBMRC- Dance
with artists L. Subramanian CSSSC visual Performance at
A. Dodiya and N. Grancho archives with Dakshina Chitra
G. Patel S. Lewis K. Mukherjee Museum
Dinner at
Dinner: personal Dinner: personal Conference Dinner: personal Dinner: personal
Dakshina Chitra
arrangements arrangements Dinner arrangements arrangements
MuseumProgram
Sunday, Nov 24 Monday, Nov 25
7:35am Departure/ Travel to
9:00am Academy Introduction
Kolkata
Welcome by Nachiket Chanchani and Hannah
Flight 6E 6749
Baader
Meeting Point: Sea-front opposite Soona Mahal,
12:00pm Lunch at Jadunath Bhavan Mu-
seum and Resource Center (JBMRC)/ Cen-
143 Marine Drive, Mumbai
tre for Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta
(CSSSC)
9:30am Walking Tour along
UNESCO World Heritage Victorian 1:30–5:00pm Tour
Gothic and Art Deco buildings of Victoria Memorial Hall with Tapati Guha-
Mumbai Thakurta (Centre for Studies in Social Sciences,
with Mustansir Dalvi (Sir JJ school of Architecture,
Calcutta)
Mumbai)
12:00pm Lunch at CSMVS Visitor Centre
Tuesday, Nov 26
1:00pm Gallery Walk through
CSMVS
with a curator of the ongoing special exhibition
9:15am Meeting at JBMRC
‘India and the Netherlands in the Age of Rem-
brandt’ 9:30–10:00am Preliminaries
Welcome adress by Rosinka Chaudhuri
2:00pm Tea and Coffee Break (Director, CSSSC)
Brief introduction to the symposium by Nachiket
Chanchani
2:15pm Talk Introduction of all participants, panel chairs,
by Sabyasachi Mukherjee (Director General, and discussants
CSMVS) on the making of the ‘India and the
World’ exhibition (2018) and the current special 10:00–11:15am
exhibition followed by a Q+A session
Symposium Panel 1
3:30pm Tea and Coffee Break Natasha Kimmet (Universität Wien)
Buddhist Clay Sculpture Production in the Shahi
Kingdoms
4:00pm Conversation
with artists Geive Patel and Anju Dodiya on their Joeeta Pal (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New
work and its worldly affiliations Delhi)
The Afterlife of Kanheri: The Multiple Participants
in an Extended Mortuary Tradition
6Panel Chair and Discussant: 3:00–4:15pm
Hannah Baader (Forum Transregionale Stu- Symposium Panel 4
dien/ KHI Florenz – MPI )
Mohit Manohar (Yale University, New Haven)
Making and Remaking the Tomb of Sher Shah Suri
11:15–11:30am Tea and Coffee Break in British India
11:30–12:45pm Pimmanus Wibulsilp (Chulalongkorn Univer-
Symposium Panel 2 sity, Bangkok)
The Majestic Red Building That Burned Down:
Ross Bernhaut (University of Michigan, Ann
Reconsidering the Indo-Anglo Cultural Encounters
Arbor)
and Exchanges in the Late Eighteenth-Century
The Making and Remaking of the Jain Rock-Cut
Nawabi Karnatak Through the History of the Che-
Sculptures at Gwalior: Expressions in Text, Image,
pauk Palace
and Stone
Panel Chair and Discussant:
Parul Singh (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New
Nachiket Chanchani (University of Michigan,
Delhi)
Ann Arbor)
Framing Reality: Photo-Mimetic Portraiture in the
Windsor Castle Ishqnama Illustrated Manuscript
4:15–4:30pm Tea and Coffee Break
Panel Chair and Discussant: Sanjoy Mallik
(Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan)
4:30–5:45pm
Symposium Panel 5
12:45–1:45pm Lunch
Nuncho Grancho (Instituto Universitário de
Lisboa)
1:45–3:00pm Asia on the Move: Two-Way Processes, Data and
Symposium Panel 3 Legacy of Architectural History from Former Portu-
Mrinalini Sil (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New guese Colonial Territories in India
Delhi)
Collection and Commission: Formation of the Sarojini Lewis (Jawaharlal Nehru University,
‘Nabobs’ Oriental Art Collection from Eighteenth- New Delhi)
Century Bengal Visuals of Bhojpuri Migrants: Situating the Archive
Through a Contemporary Lens/ Silences of Seas:
Nimra Rizvi (Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Sea A Non-Archive?
Delhi)
Cultural Transactions Through Object Circulation: Panel Chair and Discussant:
Awadh and the World, 1750–1857 Lakshmi Subramanian (BITS Pilani, Goa)
Panel Chair and Discussant:
Tapati Guha-Thakurta (Centre for Studies in 7:00pm Conference Dinner
Social Sciences, Calcutta)
7Wednesday, Nov 27 1:45–3:00pm
Symposium Panel 8
10:00–11:15am
Saumya Agarwal (Universität Heidelberg)
Symposium Panel 6 The Heterogeneous Temporalities of the Painted
Vivek Gupta (SOAS University of London) Cenotaphs of Shekhawati
Imagining Somnath: Mirabilia Indiae in Islamicate
Cosmographies of South Asia Shradda Bhatawadekar (Brandenburgische
Technische Universität, Cottbus-Senftenberg)
Priyani Roy Choudhury (Humboldt-Universität A Railway Station as a Visual Narrative: Under-
zu Berlin) standing the Railway Heritage of India in a Global
The Plantain on the Pillar: A Visual Arc Between Context. The Case of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj
Fatehpur Sikri and the Indian Ocean Rim Terminus, Mumbai
Panel Chair and Discussant: Panel Chair and Discussant:
Rajarshi Ghose (Centre for Studies in Social Sci- Prachi Deshpande (Centre for Studies in Social
ences, Calcutta) Sciences, Calcutta)
11:15–11:30am Tea and CoffeeBreak 3:00–4:15pm
Symposium Panel 9
11:30–12:45pm Jessica Bachmann (University of Washington,
Symposium Panel 7 Seattle)
Towards a Material and Cultural History of Soviet
Sandipan Mitra (Presidency University, Kolkata)
Book Consumption in Post-Colonial South Asia,
Human Models: Colonialism, Anthropology and the
1954–1973
Global Circulation of the Clay Works of Krishnana-
gar
Irene López Arnaiz (Universidad de Madrid)
William Bamber (University of Washington, A Transcultural and Transdisciplinary Modernism:
Seattle) The Meeting of Indian Dances and the Parisian
From Ottoman Istanbulin to Hyderabadi Sherwani: Avante-garde
A Transnational Men’s Style in late-19th Century
South Asia, 1869–1911 Panel Chair and Discussant:
Trina Nileena Banerjee (Centre for Studies in
Panel Chair and Discussant: Social Sciences, Calcutta)
Rosinka Chaudhuri (Centre for Studies in Social
Sciences, Calcutta) 4:15–4:30pm Tea and Coffee Break
12:45–1:45pm Lunch 4:30–6:00pm Introduction to the
visual archives of CSSSC
by Kamalika Mukherjee
8Thursday, Nov 28
1:00–6:00pm Visit of
8:15am Departure/ Travel to Mahabalipuram: ‘Temples as
Chennai Archives’
Flight 6E 563
12:30–1:45pm Lunch at Dakshina Chitra
Museum
Saturday, Nov 30
with Deborah Thiagarajan and Sharath Nambiar,
both directors of Dakshina Chitra Museum 9:45am Meeting at Dakshina Chitra
Museum
1:45–2:00pm Introduction to the
Museum 10:00–11:45am Hands-on
by Deborah Thiagarajan Workshop: ‘Making Things in India’
2:00pm Tour of Dakshina Chitra 11:45–12:00pm Break
Museum
with Deborah Thiagarajan, Sharath Nambiar, 12:00–12:30pm Discussion
and Suresh Sethuraman following the workshop
6:00pm Dance performance 12:30–1:00pm Wrap-up Discussion:
at Dakshina Chitra, followed by dinner on Academy final wrap-up discussion: India and the
campus World: New Arcs of Knowledge
1:00–2:00pm Lunch
Friday, Nov 29 2:00pm End of Academy/
Departure from Chennai
9:45am Meeting at Dakshina Chitra
Museum
10:00–12:00pm Round Table
Conversation: ‘The Indian Home as
an Archive’
Deborah Thiagarajan (Dakshina Chitra
Museum/ Madras Craft Foundation, Chennai),
Rathi Jafer (Indo-Korea Cultural and
Information Centre, Chennai)
Benny Kuriakose (architect, Chennai),
Sadanand Menon (arts curator, editor,
columnist, photographer)
12:00–1:00pm Lunch at Dakshina Chitra
Museum
910
Participants and Projects
Saumya Agarwal the chatri, was popularized by the Mughals, and
subsequently emulated by Rajput royalty. In her
is a PhD student at the Cluster of Transcultural paper, Agarwal will analyze the appropriation
Studies at Heidelberg University, Germany. In of these structures by the merchant community
her thesis, she historicizes the wall paintings of Shekhawati as an entry into history, that is,
of Shkhawati, an under-researched area of an attempt to defeat death and oblivion through
visual culture. Agarwal analyzes visual mate- monumentalization. Yet, such memorialization
rial to understand transformations effected by is at odds with Hindu notions of eschatology,
transcultural contacts. The primary transforma- and the thematics of the paintings decorating
tion, she sheds light on, is the changing concep- these structures, like the representations of the
tion of the temporal with the introduction of a avatars of Vishnu, often create a counter-narra-
mechanized clock time. Concepts of temporality tive. By analyzing the competing notions of time,
are also linked to her larger research interests in one linear and the other cyclical, created by the
heritage practices and archives. Agarwal actively structure and the paintings within, Agarwal will
engaged in exploring both themes in a global elucidate hybrid temporalities. Furthermore,
context during her time as a research fellow at she will use this discussion on temporalities
the Musée du quai Branly, Paris (2016–17). She to reflect upon the contemporary heritagiza-
holds an MPhil, MA and BA in Literary Studies tion practices in the area that are often divided
from the University of Delhi. She has worked as between conservation and preservation efforts.
a lecturer of English Literature at the University
of Delhi for several years. As an extension of
her research interests, she frequently writes Jessica Bachman
commentaries on visual culture, iconography is a PhD candidate in the History Department at
and contemporary politics for newspapers and the University of Washington. She specializes in
independent news websites. modern South Asian and global Cold War his-
tory. Her dissertation looks at the USSR’s estab-
The Heterogeneous Temporalities of lishment of the world’s largest global book trans-
lation and publication program during the Cold
the Painted Cenotaphs of Shekhawati
War and analyzes its cultural and social effects
The Shekhawati region in Rajasthan is famous across South Asia. She has received grants from
for its painted buildings. Financed by the the Mellon Foundation, SSRC, Fulbright-Hays,
Marwari merchant community, the paintings American Councils, and CAORC to conduct two
flourished during the period of accelerated Euro- years of dissertation research in Russia and
pean contact (1750–1950). Hybrid images are India where she will be based between 2018 and
thus the hallmark of these structures. Images 2020. Prior to graduate school, she worked as
like Christ smoking a cigar, Hindu gods listening a journalist in Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and
to the gramophone and flying in automobiles or Bangalore reporting for Thomson Reuters, the
Queen Victoria glancing askance at a copulating Economist, Time, and other publications. Bach-
couple, are some iconic examples. Hybridity man also runs an oral history project entitled
though, in both architecture and art, predates Bollywood and Bolsheviks which features oral
the colonial contact. Telling examples of this are history interviews with former South Asian
the opulently painted mortuary monuments or translators, distributors, and readers of Soviet
chatris. A result of the Indo-Islamic encounter, books. The online project originally formed
11part of a 2016 exhibition entitled Bollywood and
Bolsheviks: Indo-Soviet Collaboration in Literature William Bamber
and Film, 1954–1991, which Bachman organized Originally from Britain, Bamber is a PhD candi-
at the University of Washington’s Suzzallo and date in the University of Washington’s Interdis-
Allen Library. ciplinary Near and Middle East Studies program,
with an additional specialization in South Asian
studies. His research focuses on the global his-
Towards a Material and Cultural His-
tory of the nineteenth-century, with particular
tory of Soviet Book Consumption in emphasis on historical evolutions of male cos-
Post-Colonial South Asia, 1954–1973 tume and masculinity, movements of aesthetic
forms and the social history of Ottoman Turkey
In Western academic discourse, Soviet books are
and South Asia. He completed his MA in Turkish
often characterized as “weapons” which were
studies at Sabancı University in Istanbul and is
strategically deployed during the Cold War in an
now in the final stages of his dissertation, sup-
ideological battle for the “hearts and minds” of
ported by an ACLS-Mellon writing fellowship.
the decolonizing Third World. This paper chal-
lenges the utility of this military metaphor by
looking at what readers from post-colonial South From Ottoman Istanbulin to Hyderab-
Asia actually did with Soviet books. Applying adi Sherwani: A Transnational Men’s
Arjun Appadurai’s well-known argument that
Style in late-19th Century South Asia
things, like people, have social lives to the study
of material and textual objects that remain This paper traces the history of the Hyderabadi
stubbornly pigeonholed as “propaganda,” Bach- sherwani jacket, from its origins in a mid-19th
man argues that for many South Asian readers, century Ottoman men’s style to becoming the
the widespread circulation of Soviet books on embodiment of revitalized Hyderabadi regional
the subcontinent between the early 1950s and identity. Bamber argues that the distinctive aes-
1990s served as an exciting opportunity to cre- thetic which evolved around the sherwani with
ate new cultural objects. Her analysis, based fez/rumi topi exemplifies new notions of urbane
on a reading of archival sources and letters modernity then emerging across the region,
from India, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka reveals which sought to express a civilized, cosmopoli-
how a variety of imaginative bricolage practices tan, yet consciously non-Western identity. The
emerged out of readers’ material engagements wide popularization of an Ottoman style across
with Soviet books and associated printed South and Southeast Asia, moreover, illustrates
ephemera (e.g. dustjackets, photographs, color the growing importance of other transnational
illustrations, pocket calendars). In doing so, networks than the European-imperial, not only
Bachman sheds light on how everyday individu- political-economically but also in the realm of
als were able to cultivate a sense of belonging aesthetic exchange. Bamber draws on collections
both at home and in the world in a post-colonial of costume, studio portraiture and Urdu popular
context where paper was always in short supply, print to document the material evolution, uses
book ownership was a luxury, and local print and meanings progressively constructed through
media was rarely produced using multi-tone the style. Initially characterized by sober shades
offsetting printing processes. and plain fabrics, the 1890s saw a resurgence
of bright colors, bold patterning and silk, as
Hyderabadi statesmen sought to resuscitate
domestic textile production and assert a new
national aesthetics. Unlike other regions where
the topi-sherwani style became associated with
12Muslim nationalism, here it became a favorite discursive, pictorial, and literal reshaping of
anecdotal proof of the communal harmony par- these Jain monuments Bernhaut will primarily
ticular to Hyderabad and the historical Deccan, examine three sorts of evidence: The written
where educated Hindus and Muslims could not testimony originally composed in Chaghatay
be distinguished by dress. Turkish and recorded in the Baburnama, the
corresponding painting from a late-sixteenth-
century Persian manuscript translation of the
Baburnama, and the material remains of the
Ross Lee Bernhaut Jain sculptures themselves. This triangulation
of textual, painted, and archaeological evidence
is a second-year doctoral student in the His-
complicates conventional synchronic and unidi-
tory of Art at the University of Michigan, Ann
mensional scholarly accounts of image making
Arbor. Bernhaut’s research focuses on the
and marring at Gwalior. He also considers the
art and architecture of medieval South Asia.
subsequent Jain replastering of the heads on
However, his interests are manifold and span
many of the Jinas, the association of a miracle
from the Himalayas to Southeast Asia, and from
story with a colossal image of Parshvanatha, and
premodern visual culture to modern art and
the rock-hewn sculptures’ eventual transforma-
historiography. He has worked as an intern and
tion into an archaeological site in the colonial
curatorial research assistant in the Department
period.
of Asian Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art,
New York. He has also presented research on the
intersection of artistic and yogic influences in
the Himalayan landscape paintings of Nicholas
Roerich at the 46th Annual Conference on South
Shraddha
Asia at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Ross holds an MA in the History of Art from the
Bhatawadekar
University of Pennsylvania (2018) and a BA in is a research associate at the Brandenburg
the History of Art from the University of Michi- University of Technology, Cottbus-Senftenberg,
gan (2016). Germany and affiliated with the DFG Research
Training Group “Cultural and Technological Sig-
nificance of Historic Buildings”. She is currently
The Making and Remaking of the pursuing her PhD on the topic of Indian railway
Jain Rock-Cut Sculptures at Gwalior: heritage, with a special focus on Chhatrapati
Expressions in Text, Image, and Stone Shivaji Maharaj Terminus, a UNESCO World
Heritage Site located in the city of Mumbai.
Carved into the outcroppings of Gwalior hill
Using a critical lens, she aims to develop a holis-
in Madhya Pradesh are more than 1,500
tic understanding of its cultural significance.
Jain images, mainly Tirthankaras and their
Bhatawadekar obtained an MA in Ancient Indian
attendants. While some of the images were
History, Culture and Archaeology from Deccan
fashioned in the seventh century, the majority
College Post-Graduate and Research Institute,
were completed in the mid-fifteenth century
Pune, India. She has actively worked in the field
in a proliferation of Digambara Jain sculptural
of heritage management and conservation. She
activity implicating the monastic community,
takes special interest in heritage education and
lay patrons, and local rulers. This paper queries
has organized several outreach programs. She
the ways in which these images have, since
has written widely on the topics of heritage, cul-
their initial fabrication, been continually made
ture and tourism in academic journals, books as
and remade at various moments in history by
well as in regional newspapers and magazines.
different communities. In order to analyze the
13Bhatawadekar has received the Fulbright-Nehru
Academic and Professional Excellence Fellow- Nuno Grancho
ship (2015–16) and the Alexander von Humboldt is an architect, urban planner, architectural
German Chancellor Fellowship (2016–17), which historian and theorist. He works at the intersec-
has further reinforced a transcultural approach tion of architecture, planning, material culture
to her research. and colonial practices and its relationship with
the transatlantic world and (post)colonial Asia
from the early 16th century up to the present
A Railway Station as a Visual Narra-
day. Within this field, his research is focused
tive: Understanding the Railway Herit- on questions of human and material agency, the
age of India in a Global Context. The epistemology and geopolitics of architecture
Case of Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj and urbanism as a technique of social interven-
Terminus, Mumbai tion. Grancho specializes in the ties between
colonialism, architecture and urbanism and has
Railway stations built in the late 19th and written widely about architecture, urbanism, art
early 20th century constitute a part of a larger and architecture of empire, infrastructure, and
process of internationalization, which witnessed the cultural landscape of European colonial-
the transfer of technology, material, people ism. Grancho holds a PhD in architecture and
and knowledge across the world. Therefore, urbanism from the University of Coimbra (2017).
international influences are evident in station In 2012, Grancho was a visiting researcher at
architecture, aesthetics, engineering and tech- the Centre for Environmental Planning and
nological advancements. But at the same time, Technology (CEPT), Architecture and Settle-
adaptations to suit local conditions have shaped ment Conservation Department, Ahmedabad,
and reshaped these processes, resulting in a India. In 2014 and 2015, Grancho was a visiting
hybrid product. Viewing the station building as researcher at SOAS University of London. Since
an archive can offer numerous glimpses into this 2017, Grancho has been a research fellow at
exchange and amalgam. This subject is hitherto DINÂMIA'CET- University Institute of Lisbon
unsufficiently researched in the Indian context. (ISCTE-IUL).
In her PhD research, Bhatawadekar focuses on
the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Railway Termi-
nus (CSMT), a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Asia on the Move: Two-Way Pro-
Mumbai, and aims at exploring its multi-layered cesses, Data and Legacy of Architec-
cultural significance. She will look at the period tural History from Former Portuguese
from 1853 when the railways first ran in Mum- Colonial Territories in India
bai until the end of the 1920s. She attempts
to read the station along with other visual and This research project aims to produce a new and
literary material and draw on select processes, bilateral understanding of the spread of Portu-
contexts and actors to demonstrate the hybrid- guese colonial architecture and urbanism across
ity of station development. This paper aims at India since the 17th century (post-Enlighten-
establishing the holistic significance of railway ment) and conversely the imprint of Indian
heritage, while also placing the narrative of architecture on Portuguese Western architecture
Indian railway heritage within a global context. and urbanism by focusing on its semantics and
materiality of objects and images, engaging
both Western and non-Western environments.
It posits that the bilateral colonial channel (e.g.
architecture made by the Portuguese in India),
represented but one aspect of a larger multifac-
14eted history that is equally the heritage of many June 2019 onwards, he holds a research place-
other cultures and communities. By combining ment at the British Library on illumination in
the disciplines of art history and architectural Persian manuscripts. In September 2019, he
history with museum studies and area stud- co-organized the symposium Connected Courts:
ies, the intention is to map and analyze more Art of the South Asian Sultanates at the University
complex and under-rated dissemination patterns of Oxford. His current research considers word
and border-crossing relationships between and image, transculturation, Arabic in South
Europe and India. By using objects and images Asia, and the relationship between contempo-
(drawings in travelogues, Indian urban cartogra- rary and premodern practices. His research has
phy, etc.) produced and used in the Indian sub- been supported by the Smithsonian Institu-
continent and neglected in the West, Grancho tion, the Social Sciences Research Council, the
seeks to explore different historical and literary Kamran Djam Fellowship for Iranian Studies,
representations as sources for the production of the Saraswati Dalmia Fellowship for Indian Art,
knowledge and to reflect on the culture/power and the Santander Mobility Award. His academic
nexus, in a transnational scope. The scientific publications have appeared in Archives of Asian
focus will be on the development of a model for Art, caa.reviews, and the Encyclopedia of Indian
documenting and analyzing the transregional Religions.
and transnational mobility, transfer and trans-
lation of architecture and urbanism between
Europe and India as well as its appropriation.
Imagining Somnath: Mirabilia Indiae
The emphasis of this research project will be on in Islamicate Cosmographies of South
the mapping of the built environment itself as a Asia
key to documenting and studying the emergence
of European architecture and urbanism in India While the wonders of India or "mirabilia indiae"
and the counterpart, the imprint of Indian archi- have been a source of interest for scholars
tecture on Portuguese Western architecture focused on the premodern West, they have been
and urbanism, and all the transnational issues largely neglected within the field of South Asian
at stake. This should allow us to gain a better illustrated manuscripts. In premodern India,
understanding of how European architectural wonder was integrated into scholarly curricula
and urban knowledge, expertise and practices as knowledge fertile for transcultural innova-
have disseminated outside of Europe in some- tions. Its popularity in the medieval Islamicate
times sinuous ways that cross national, colonial world inspired many Indic literary and mate-
and linguistic boundaries. rial forms of expression. Because India has
served as the site and source of wonder, Gupta
explores how this concept was reoriented in an
Vivek Gupta Asian context ca. 1450 to 1600. The holy site of
Somnath intrigued the makers of fifteenth- and
is an art historian of the Islamic, South Asian,
sixteenth-century Islamicate cosmographical
and Indian Ocean worlds. His doctoral thesis,
encyclopaedias of South Asia. Dated to the mid-
Wonder Reoriented: Manuscripts and Experience in
fifteenth century, the earliest known illustrated
Islamicate Societies of South Asia (ca. 1450–1600),
wonders-of-creation manuscript possibly made
will be submitted in 2019–2020 at SOAS Univer-
in the subcontinent passed through the Deccan
sity of London, History of Art and Archaeology.
cities of Bidar and Bijapur. Unlike contempora-
His thesis offers the first full-length study of
neous Persian cosmographies, this manuscript’s
how the genre of the Islamicate cosmography
map of the world has labels of specific sites such
transformed in South Asia through an analysis
as Somnath, Patan, and Telangana. Through
of roughly 50 illustrated manuscripts. From
an exploration of roughly 50 illustrated cosmo-
15graphical manuscripts, this presentation exam- datable to the 6th–7th and 7th–8th centuries,
ines topographical wonders such as Somnath. respectively) differ stylistically, yet indicate
In so doing, it examines how these manuscripts related production techniques and functions
situated specific Indian phenomena not only as found across the Shahi kingdoms. While
on the map of the world, but also in the entire clay became the preferred medium in eastern
universe. Afghanistan and Pakistan around the 6th cen-
tury, inadequate scholarly attention has been
given to the subject. Kimmet reassesses the
Natasha Kimmet popular identification of the Akhnur and Ushkur
objects as terracotta, instead following the argu-
is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Uni- ment of Varma (1970) that they are unbaked
versity of Vienna and member of the Austrian clay. The scarce architectural and archaeological
Science Fund project “Cultural Formation and evidence and comparison to late Gupta terracot-
Transformation: Shahi Art and Architecture tas as well as clay objects in Afghanistan and
from Afghanistan to the West Tibetan at the Central Asia further indicate that the Akhnur
Dawn of the Islamic Era”. Her current research and Ushkur objects were likely affixed to a Bud-
investigates Buddhist clay sculpture produc- dhist architectural setting and assembled in a
tion in the Shahi Kingdoms. Kimmet received narrative context. These sculpture fragments
her PhD in Art History from the University of allow the examination of new arcs of knowledge
Vienna in 2019, with a specialization in the across a vast expanse of Inner and South Asia
art and architecture of South Asia, Tibet, and during a period of intense cultural mobility. This
the Himalayas. Her doctoral research was paper considers the significance of these objects
supported by a fellowship from the Center for for defining the corpus of Shahi material culture
Interdisciplinary Research and Documentation and its transmission across the northwest of the
of Inner and South Asian Cultural History. Kim- Indian subcontinent.
met has taught in the Kabul Museum Project
Curator Training Program in collaboration with
the National Museum of Afghanistan, and was
the 2015–2017 Curatorial Fellow at the Rubin
Sarojini Lewis
Museum of Art, where she curated the exhibi- has a background in visual studies and fine art
tion Monumental Lhasa: Fortress, Palace, Temple. with a specialization in archival photography,
She has published several articles examining video art and book arts. She is currently working
secular and religious art and architecture in the as a researcher, artist and curator. Besides her
Western Himalayas. doctoral research at Jawaharlal Nehru Univer-
sity, New Delhi, her visual work and curated pro-
jects display a fascination with history, the land-
Buddhist Clay Sculpture Production in scape, the city, the environment and its user.
the Shahi Kingdoms What would unite them, what kind of view is
there, on what is it focused? Repetitive elements
This project offers a critical investigation of the
in Lewis’ research are photographs of objects,
clay heads and sculptural fragments attributed
people, migration and moments that reveal for-
to Akhnur and Ushkur in India’s Jammu-
gotten situations and function as visual traces
Kashmir region at the Eastern extremity of the
and fragments, creating narratives leading to
Shahi kingdoms (7th–10th centuries CE). The
new perspectives. Lewis has participated in sev-
research aims to bring together the objects now
eral projects of the Goethe-Institut (2018–2015)
dispersed in museum collections worldwide to
and in artists books in permanent art collections
better articulate how they were produced and
such as the Tate Britain and British Library. She
used. These two groups of sculptures (tentatively
16was part of curation project in Social Science a silent zone; visual documentation from ships
Institute GB Pant in Allahabad (2018), Kochi rarely reveal female experience. The archive thus
Biennale (2016), for Contemporary Art Tent in has a blind spot that urges us to drift away from
Rotterdam (2018) or Stroom NL (2018), and sev- the colonial documentation. In this research,
eral international exhibitions such as Museum Lewis presents a series of archival photographs
Escravidão e Liberdade in Brazil (2018) or PIVO made of indentured labourers on board of ships
Sao Paulo (2019). and show how in this material one can speak of
an absence of female representation. Diaries and
female testimonies can be connected to these
Visuals of Bhojpuri Migrants: Situating boat journeys and used as a contemporary lens
the Archive Through a Contemporary from artists who visualised the situations absent
Lens/ Silences of Seas: Sea A Non- from photographs.
Archive?
This research attempts a comparative study
of archival photographs and contemporary art Irene López Arnaiz
from different destination colonies of indentured holds a PhD in Art History from the Com-
labourers from India, who migrated in the mid- plutense University of Madrid (Spain). She has
nineteenth century to Surinam, British Guiana, a BA in Art History and an MA in Museum and
Trinidad, Jamaica and Mauritius. Lewis aims to Heritage Studies. She is a member of Trama
understand how identity formation was influ- Research Project and she currently collaborates
enced by diverse circumstances of migrant com- with the Thyssen-Bornemisza National Museum
munities in the Caribbean and Indian Ocean. in a project of coordination of guides and organi-
The present generation of India diaspora living zation of contents related to the permanent
in the destination colonies has migration roots collection and temporary exhibitions, within
mostly from the Bhojpuri area in India, where the framework of Corporate Events Programme.
people had the agricultural skills to work with Between 2014 and 2018 she was a Predoctoral
sugarcane. This region covers the western part Fellow at Complutense University of Madrid.
of Bihar and eastern Uttar Pradesh. In recent She has completed five research stays in Paris
years, a number of contemporary artists of this and London at Institut national d’historire de
diaspora have turned to archival photographs to l’art (INHA), Centre d’études de l’Inde et de l’Asie
creatively engage with the process of their iden- du Sud (CEIAS, EHEE-CNRS) and Victoria and
tity formation. Migration processes are not sin- Albert Museum, financed by several scholar-
gle events as, between origin and destinations, ships.
multiple connections have evolved. Migration is
a process where places and people are connected
beyond distances and political borders. Artists A Transcultural and Transdisciplinary
from the Caribbean and Indian Ocean estab- Modernism: The Meeting of Indian
lished a visual language that points to multiple Dances and the Parisian Avant-garde
interpretations on identity and memory.
This paper poses a critical study of Indian
Silences of the sea are connected to colonial
performing traditions as one of the numerous
documentation; scholars like Guiatra Bahadur
and eclectic elements that fostered the forging of
and Marina Carter unravel several experiences
western modernism and a more extensive global
of female indentured labourers. These experi-
modernism in a time when, as a result of impe-
ences are kept like hidden memories of the sea
rial politics, Europe discovered different cultures
in several archives. The absence of photographs
and artistic traditions. This investigation shows
made on ships and sea passages reminds us of
17the essential role these processes of interchange Can South Asian buildings, drastically altered
played in the Parisian artistic avant-garde by the British, also be thought of as British
between the end of the 19th century and the heritage? Manohar’s paper wrestles with these
first half of the 20th century. It seems necessary questions by focusing on the 1882–83 “restora-
to restore the role Indian dancers played during tion” of the tomb of Sher Shah Suri in Sasaram
their travels to France from 1838 onwards. In (built 1545 CE). The tomb initially had a chhatri
these travels, they revealed to Western audiences (domed pavilion) crowning its main dome, but H.
their performing traditions, which would later H. Cole, then Curator of Ancient Monuments in
become a fertile source of inspiration for both India, complained that it did not resemble other
artists and dancers based in the West. Moreover, “Pathan tombs,” most of which were crowned
it is seemingly indispensable to highlight the by a finial. He was convinced that the chhatri
contribution of “Hindu female dancers” to this was not original to the tomb and demanded it be
same modernism throughout a whole set of replaced by a finial. His “renovation” thus dras-
complex mechanisms they developed in relation tically altered the building’s form, making an
to the image forged around their predecessors. unusual tomb profile—there are very few extant
This work thus enhances their invaluable role tombs with a crowning chhatri—appear usual.
in the artistic panorama, not only as pioneers of Manohar takes a critical look at this “restora-
early modern dance, but also as active drivers of tion.” He rehabilitates the chhatri to the main
the configuration of modernism in other artistic dome of Sher Shah Suri’s tomb and analyzes
fields in a time when painters and sculptors how its placement complicates the building’s
found in the art of dance the materialization of program. Manohar further theorizes why the
their own creative concerns. chhatri was removed from the tomb by contextu-
alizing its role in Indo-Saracenic buildings that
were contemporary to this “restoration.”
Mohit Manohar
is a PhD Candidate in the History of Art at
Yale University. He is writing his dissertation
Sandipan Mitra
on the Deccani city of Daulatabad, focusing is a doctoral candidate in sociology at Presidency
on its architectural and urban history in the University, Kolkata. He has previously obtained
fourteenth century. Other areas of interest a BA and an MA in sociology from Presidency
include Mughal and Deccani painting, colonial University and an MPhil from the Centre for
Indian architecture, and the historiography of Studies in Social Sciences, Calcutta. His MPhil
South Asian Islamic art. Recent publications dissertation examined the ways in which
include a catalog entry on the influence of John anthropology as a discipline developed out of
Ruskin’s political-economic theory on Gandhi. an intersection of multiple scholarly fields and
Manohar also writes fiction and his short stories institutional sites in colonial Bengal. Mitra’s cur-
have appeared in American literary journals. He rent research explores the connections between
received a BA in art history and creative writing anthropology and governance in India by focus-
from Princeton University. ing on the intersections of anthropological imag-
ination, pedagogic practices and governmental
techniques. His PhD thesis assimilates metro-
Making and Remaking the Tomb of politan debates across anthropology, political
Sher Shah Suri in British India economy and economics, colonial and post-
colonial governmental practices, works of Indian
What was the colonial understanding of “archi-
anthropologists, and the politics of empire and
tectural restoration” and how have these shaped
nation-states in non-Western countries. He is
extant pre-colonial monuments in South Asia?
18interested in the history of Bengal, the history nection between science and art, objectivity and
of anthropology, anthropology of states and aesthetics in general. In doing so, it argues that
the political economy of Indian society. He is a the colonial encounter with this art form acted
recipient of the Sahapedia-UNESCO Fellowship as a formative site for anthropology in India. The
(2018) and was a part of the research team which larger objective of Mitra’s work is to comprehend
prepared the dossier for the nomination of the the epistemological status of these human mod-
Durga Pujas of Kolkata for possible inscription els within the emerging knowledge practices of
on UNESCO’s Representative List of Intangible the nineteenth century.
Cultural Heritage (ICH) of Humanity (2019).
Human Models: Colonialism, Anthro- Joeeta Pal
pology and the Global Circulation of is a PhD student at Jawaharlal Nehru University,
the Clay Works of Krishnanagar New Delhi. Her thesis attempts to trace the vari-
ous modes of engagement with death in early
The clay art of Krishnanagar in Nadia is an Buddhism between the fourth century BCE and
integral component of Bengal’s vibrant cultural the fourth century CE. The study discerns the
heritage. It has thrived under royal patronage practices and ideas relating to mourning, memo-
since the mid-eighteenth century. During the rialization and the different spaces allocated to
second half of the nineteenth century, it attained the two by using historical, archaeological and
global prominence as life-size and miniature art-historical sources. Her MPhil dissertation
human models made by the artists of Krish- looked at multivalent death practices at sites of
nanagar became a major point of attraction at the Indus Valley Civilization through an analysis
transnational exhibition spaces, from where they of burials at Kalibangan and Lothal. Pal’s other
often found their way into museums. Unlike research interests include prehistoric burials and
the mechanically-prepared shoddy plaster casts the politics of death in more recent times.
of human skulls and fossils that were then
used by phrenologists and paleontologists as
legitimate means of reproducing knowledge, The Afterlife of Kanheri: The Multiple
the scientific authority of these manually made Participants in an Extended Mortuary
clay models and their replicas was derived from Tradition
their precision and realistic appeal. It was their
life-like appearance which made them popular This paper shall argue that a place can retain the
among the colonial anthropologists who were imprint of death even after its abandonment. It
obsessed with using such techniques of study makes this argument on the basis of a spatial
that offered an objective guarantee of certainty. analysis of the site of Kanheri. Located in the
The ‘science of man’ therefore realised itself by contemporary city of Mumbai, its Buddhist occu-
appropriating an indigenous art form that could pation may be dated to between the second and
potentially bridge the gap between reality and tenth centuries CE. The site housed a Buddhist
representation. This project intends to explore monastic settlement with a chaitya, rooms for
the relationship between anthropology and the monks, water tanks and a high density of ‘votive’
clay art of Krishnanagar by closely probing the stupas. By the tenth century, Buddhist monks
lives of the human models within the anthro- had ended their occupation of the site. Kanheri,
pological galleries of the Calcutta International however, did not disappear into obscurity and
Exhibition (1883–1884) and the Indian Museum different groups including Portuguese travelers,
and their travels across the imperial world. colonial explorers and the locals have engaged
Simultaneously, it also aims to think of the con- with the memorial stupas in different ways. Every
act of remembrance involves an element of forget-
19ting. While the Buddhist past of the caves seems Cultural Transactions through Object
to have been forgotten, the Buddhist manner of
Circulation: Awadh and the World,
memorialization remained. The identification of
the place with death and memory is likely to have
1750–1857
been from the residual memories of the locals Traditionally, the history of Awadh has been
passed through oral tradition but the familiarity subsumed under the meta-narratives of the
of all humans with death is likely to have also Mughal Empire's decline decentralized control,
enabled such an association. Pal’s paper thus and the establishment of colonial authority. This
looks to explain how the identification of Kanheri is due to the nature of the colonial archive as
as a site for memorialization was recognized and well as the academic gaze that has been trained
utilized by groups that were unfamiliar with Bud- by this archive of political correspondences,
dhism and how they chose to become a part of secret reports and agricultural surveys. Rizvi
the site. That the space of the stupas was mean- argues for a need to negotiate with the material
ingful to them in death and memorialization is culture of this period by examining lists, inven-
worthy of recognition. tories, travelogues, paintings, letters and jour-
nals of the Nawab, Company officials and other
Europeans in Awadh to challenge existing nar-
Nimra Rizvi ratives centering political and economic decay,
decline and supremacy of British authority. She
is a doctoral student at the Centre for Historical argues that objects in circulation became instru-
Studies of Jawaharlal Nehru University, New ments of educating, enquiring, subjugating,
Delhi. Her thesis is titled Articulating Power and impersonating, imperializing and dominating a
Culture through Objects of Value: Awadh and the wide range people and institutions. The paper
World 1740–1857. She is particularly interested will explore the material collections of collec-
in exploring production and circulation of tors like Claude Martin, Jean Baptiste Gentil
objects in Awadh and aims that her work on and Antoine Polier, the process and method of
material culture will open new avenues into collecting, as well as debates around the person
studying the vibrantly disruptive socio-cultural of the collector. The second part of this paper
histories of the eighteenth and early-nineteenth will explore how objects from these collections
century in India. Rizvi heads a project on the became sites of knowledge production in Awadh
oral history documentation of Awadh with a and about Awadh in Europe, thus pointing to a
Lucknow based organization, Sanatkada. As cultural efflorescence that set the tone for inter-
a part of this project, she has co-edited four actions across individuals, cultures, spaces and
volumes titled, Feminists of Awadh Par Salaam: borders.
Kuch Qisse Yaadien aur Baatien (2014), Filmi
Duniya Mein Awadh (2015), Lucknow Ki Rachi
Basi Tehzeeb (2016), Lucknow ki Reha’ish: At Home
in Lucknow (2017). Rizvi is also the Co-Director Priyani
of Mahindra Sanatkada Lucknow Festival, an
annual festival of history, music, literature, Roy Choudhury
cuisine, craft and weaves that is held in Luc- is a researcher currently based in New Delhi. She
know. As a part of this festival, she has curated is pursuing her PhD at the Institut für Kunst-
three exhibitions, Dar o Deewar (2017), Francisi und Bildgeschichte at Humboldt-Universität zu
Awadhi Ta’alluqaat (2018) and Husn e Karigari e Berlin. Her doctoral research, Fashioning of a
Awadh (2019). Mughal City: Fatehpur Sikri, takes a close look
into the making of the city in the context of the
architectural and cultural environs of sixteenth
20century India. Between October 2013–2017, Roy when they do not stay confined to a single
Choudhury was a fellow of the research and fel- artistic lineage or to territorial boundaries. Roy
lowship program Connecting Art Histories in the Choudhury’s paper will attempt to address this
Museum: The Mediterranean and Asia 400–1650 through an exploration of the translocation of a
(Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max- single motif between completely different tem-
Planck-Institut/ Staatliche Museen zu Berlin). poral, spatial, and material contexts.
Under its aegis she was placed at the Museum
für Islamische Kunst, Berlin, where she co-
curated, alongside Julia Gonella, the exhibition
Mystic Travellers: Sufis, Ascetics and Holy Men in
Mrinalini Sil
is a PhD research scholar of Visual Arts in the
2016.
School of Arts and Aesthetics at Jawaharlal
Nehru University, New Delhi. Having received
The Plantain on the Pillar: A Visual Arc her MA in History at Jadavpur University,
Between Fatehpur Sikri and the Indian Kolkata, she completed her MPhil titled Paint-
ing in Murshidabad in the eighteenth century: An
Ocean Rim
exploration of the patterns of art patronage at the
Certain pillars in the palace complex at Fatehpur School of Arts and Aesthetics at JNU. Finding
Sikri carry micro representations of the banana the transitional period of eighteenth century
or plantain tree. Sometimes laden with heavy most exciting in terms of the migration of ideas,
conical flowers, every blade of leaf is marked people, artistic styles and forms, her MPhil dis-
with subtle alterations each time it’s repeated. sertation dealt with patterns of art patronage
Scholarship on Fatehpur Sikri consistently in eighteenth century Murshidabad paintings.
describes these images and those of similar Working further on Murshidabad paintings
heritage as ‘Hindu/Jain motifs’. Thereby it feeds for her doctoral thesis, her research interests
a narrative which fashions Fatehpur Sikri as broadly include provincial Mughal styles of
a monument to ‘syncretic’ values. Yet in the painting, the sociology of art production in early
very demarcation of individual traditions, such modern India and notions of patronage and
descriptions become exclusionary of the cultur- collection of art in early-modern India. She had
ally complex histories and meanings that these received the UK Travel Award from the Nehru
motifs embody. How does one, for instance, read Trust for the Indian Collections at the Victoria
the plantain on the pillar crafted in sixteenth- and Albert Museum and the Sahapedia-UNESCO
century Fatehpur Sikri in juxtaposition with Fellowship and has presented several papers in
the same motif found on the grave of Umar different national and international conferences
al-Kazeruni (c.1333) in Khambhat (Cambay) in over the years
Gujarat, or on a gravestone in Oman from the
fourteenth century and another found in Suma-
tra from the fifteenth? Preeminent ports such as
Collection and Commission: Forma-
Cambay served as axes of maritime trade and tion of the ‘Nabobs’ Oriental Art
as well as sites of production. The conquest of Collections from Eighteenth-Century
Gujarat beginning in 1571 allowed the Mughals Bengal
access to these pivotal hubs of aesthetic herit-
age. The last decade has seen a turn towards The second half of the eighteenth-century in
connecting art histories over large geopolitical Bengal saw the extension of the English pres-
matrices. It has therefore become imperative ence beyond the political and mercantile realm,
to reassess our approach to ornamental motifs where the ‘Nabobs’ of the Company emerged
used in the Indian sub-continent, especially as eminent collectors and patrons unraveling
a fascinating but complicated tale of art col-
21lection and patronage. The Company ‘Nabobs’ of Wajid Ali Shah, the last king of Awadh (r.
looted, commissioned, collected, quested for 1847–1856). Her research re-examines the visual
and preserved the best of the arts of eighteenth- culture of Awadh in light of its complex socio-
century Bengal. The materials collected by political milieu, its royal political aspirations,
these men offer corporeal evidence of a time tastes, influences and underlying traditions.
and place in which parallel cultural idioms Investigation of this visual culture reveals its
and social ambitions worked to produce cross- importance for maintaining, and fortifying the
cultural fusion, making the second half of the power of the king. Parul has been awarded the
eighteenth century one of the most complex, NTICVA (Nehru Trust for the Indian Collection
perplexing but captivating and compelling of at Victoria and Albert Museum) UK Visiting
times. Thus, understanding these ‘Nabobs’ as Fellowship (2015), NTICVA- CWIT (Charles
active agents of transculturation, this paper Wallace India Trust ) joint study grant (2016),
will seek to probe into the conceptual and Inlaks Shivdasani Foundation travel grant (2015)
visual categories constructed around colonial and a study grant by the John Bissel Foundation
collecting. The eighteenth-century in Bengal (2017).
witnessed indiscriminate looting and plundering
of oriental riches by early English administra-
tors like Robert Clive to a careful patronage and
Framing Reality: Photo-Mimetic
curation of artworks to satisfy the encyclopedic Portraiture in the Windsor Castle
interests that shaped the sensibilities of the first Ishqnama Illustrated Manuscript
generation of Orientalists like Sir Elijah Impey
The Windsor Castle Ishqnama is an illustrated
and Richard Johnson. In this context the paper
manuscript of an autobiographical text writ-
will bring to the fore an illustrated Razmnama
ten in 1851 by Wajid Ali Shah, the last king of
manuscript belonging to Sir Elijah Impey and a
Awadh detailing his love life. Hinging between
set of Ragamala paintings from Richard John-
two different eras, the Ishqnama Illustrations
son’s collection (both done in the Murshidabad
cite different scopic regimes at play in nine-
style) in an attempt to trace the patterns of
teenth-century Awadh, as well as amalgamate
synthesis and exchange that took place in the
elements of a wider visual nexus in photographs,
interstices between culture, traditions, artistic
painting, and theatre. The images are hybrid and
styles and aesthetic sensibilities in the twilight
self-conscious and are a site in which emerging
period of ehe Mughal empire's waning away and
technologies such as photography, along with
emergence of the British one. Highlighting the
the western system of single-point perspective,
complex cultural entanglements of this period,
are used in the traditionally-valued format of the
an endeavor will be made to investigate the
Islamicate illustrated manuscript. These paint-
interrelation between colonial art patronage
ings disrupt the customary depiction of an ideal-
and collecting as a means of self fashioning that
ised portraiture of royal women, as they are now
evolved along with the emergence of the proto-
depicted using photographically realistic faces,
colonial intelligentsia in eighteenth-century
juxtaposed with bodies rendered in the propor-
Bengal.
tion types of idealised women. Produced at a
specific spacio-temporal point in history, this
curious hybrid set of paintings can be situated
Parul Singh within a larger field of other fin de siècle photo-
is a doctoral candidate from School of Arts and based images manipulated by techniques such
Aesthetics, Jawaharlal Nehru University, New as overpainting, collages and doubling, or the
Delhi. For her doctoral thesis, she is investigat- ‘xeno-real’ calendar images of gods made at the
ing the visual culture of Awadh during the reign juncture of impending disintegration of the old
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