Art and Deal magazine recently published a very thoughtful review of New Myths: First Incarnation, the exhibition that was held at Bombay Art Gallery this past January. Due to space restraints the review saw some editorial condensing.
Below is the original unedited essay written by Amrita Gupta-Singh.
Re-claiming Territories, Mutating Narratives
To look back at history and mythology via the lens of the contemporary is a difficult task. One asks questions like where are the beginnings of myths, where does history take primacy and how does religion/rituals function across centuries, in this case, in the Indian scenario. In many instances, like the legend of Krishna, folklore, myth, history and faith become intertwined in such a manner, that it becomes difficult to sift fact from fiction. New research on Krishna reveals that it is possible to establish the historicity of the man who lived towards the end of the Vedic age, and that he was very different from the popular myth of the adolescent playful figure so revered in Hindu religion and Vaisnavite literature. The insertions of the miraculous and supernatural to his birth, life and personality also add to his heroic mythical charisma as the god of power, bravery, mentoring and divine love.
The Udaipur based artist, Waswo X. Waswo’s recent suite of photographs ‘New Myths: First Incarnation’ is intriguing in many ways; they depict a handsome adult Krishna, complete with a lean toned body that male models in the entertainment industry vie for or college Romeos flaunt to attract the attention of the opposite sex., while also implying the male indulgence via the gaze of the artist/photographer. Waswo’s first entry point into the series was in the probing of his Christian values and a comparative exploration of Hindu mythologies given his current location in Udaipur, where the local/popular culture is filled with calendar art depicting religious deities, temple paintings, rituals, folklore, painted miniatures of Krishna and oral narratives that transmit cultural lessons, thereby instigating the process of remembering. These photographs work across two levels: as personal myths and cultural myths, conveying the particularities of the almost narcissistic playfulness of Krishna, the sexual allure/maleness of the posed model (whose real name is also Krishna), the private fantasies of the artist via the voyeuristic camera and also the critique of privileges the male god/prince/son is allotted in Indian society, which undoubtedly has a material base. These photographs are not just passive observations, but become discursive interpolations of multiple narratives/memories/story-telling rituals within and outside the photographic frame.
Waswo re-examined the myth of Krishna in contemporary Rajasthan and found curious analogies in the behavior of young males in Udaipur with the ‘playful/happy’ indulgence of Krishna, a kind of “bad-boy hero” that is found in various cultures, be it Bollywood, Hollywood or street machismo (assertive male bonding in street groups/gangs, teasing of local and foreign girls/women in Udaipur, or indulging in transgressions without the anxiety of castigation; for the entitlement of his ‘male’ birth relieves him of societal/moral censure). Is playfulness necessarily harmless, do the ‘happy’ myths of Krishna that circulate in our societies insidiously allow for the patriarchal exclusivity of male progeny, the dominant male identity?
It is also important to note that the protagonist in these photographs was also dressed as Krishna in his childhood and inducted in roles of Krishna in school dramas and pageants by his family; he almost resembles the illustrated adult Krishnas in Amar Chitra Katha comics and animation films; in many ways adopting this persona was almost natural to him. Waswo also wanted to make “his Krishna to look less like religious idols and more like the idols we create in everyday life”. The protagonist looks like a young self-conscious urbanite enacting this role with the practiced ease of being in front of the camera, not in the painted blue ‘dark’ skin as found in Indian art, but a photographic grey, emanating a masculine energy, full of vanity/self interest, desirous and desired, a timeless archetype of male beauty and the ideal lover.
The setting of these photographs seems to be a cross-over between the historical imaginary of Vrindavan and Mathura (Brajbhoomi) and contemporary Rajasthan. Waswo collaborates with local artists of Udaipur and the backdrops were painted by Zenule Khan, some copied from Waswo’s previous photographs of Udaipur and Karnataka while others were forest scenes painted from imagination, resembling enlarged miniatures. Interestingly, Zenule Khan is not a trained miniaturist but has experience in copying European landscapes on canvas and restoration of paintings in temples. These painted backdrops have the local flavour of the landscapes of Rajasthan, while the props/objects used are also found on the streets of Udaipur (cycle-carts, old scooter, saxophone, electric fan, decorative mirrors, painted wooden cows, earthen pots, Balaji Chips etc) thereby inserting the local contemporaneity in these staged photographs. Waswo has been largely influenced by the 19th century photography movement of Pictorialism (though he freely explores other photography styles) that sought to imitate the composition and atmospherics of traditional paintings and ‘making’ a photograph is of immense importance to him; this establishes the elaborate ‘stage’ and the theatricality/performavity evident in these series. Here a live performer enacts a self-contained drama via representational illusions, akin to religious or morality plays enacted in temple festivals.
This series raises curious questions, that of a contented and a contentious masculinity; the photographs have no female presences apart from two female wooden dolls; the mother Yashodha, his lover, Radha or the other gopis are missing within the frames, while Krishna in this avatar is the doted son and idealized lover. The men in Rajasthan adopt traditional patriarchal roles, living in a homoerotic universe while mapping public terrains; the women live in private domains and play the nurturing role assigned within a hegemonic system. Gender segregation is the basis, on which an authentic masculine identity is acquired, here Krishna seems to be underpinning the idea that the “male psyche is constituted in a contradictory way through the strange combination of power and powerlessness, privilege and pain” (Michael Kaufmann).
While most photographs depict Krishna as a narcissistic, self absorbed individual, there is also an anguish that one notices in his expressions. Is there a crisis in masculinity? (Jeff Hearn) Does Krishna/the local male of Udaipur grapple with the duality of the domestic embodiment of the perfect son/provider versus the sexually aggressive male on the street, a psychosocial problem in outwardly conservative societies? Love/Sex become secret, desire is played out with passing wealthy tourists, gigolos and play-boys scour the tourist locations, creating erotic relations determined by economy and class. This series investigates the notion of desire as a structure or in a psychoanalytic way, the workings of the “libido” as a social force via the lens of the male universe, via a familiar historical Hindu god who is favoured amongst the populace, while a strange conflicted alterity plays out in a contingent mode. Via reclamation of, as he says, “a happy territory from regionalists”, Waswo inserts a provocative way to re-look at myth from within the realm of the contemporary. With much humour, Waswo casts a critical eye on the proximate transmission of historical traditions, modern aspirations of liberated sexual mores and the alienating aspects of a hegemonic patriarchal masculinity, examining how stories evolve with time, and mutate with interpretation.
Amrita Gupta-Singh
March 2010
Biography:
Amrita Gupta-Singh is an art historian and writer, with an interest in arts management. Currently, she is the Program Director at the Mohile Parikh Center, Mumbai and Fellow, Arthink South Asia 2010 -11.
This series raises curious questions, that of a contented and a contentious masculinity; the photographs have no female presences apart from two female wooden dolls; the mother Yashodha, his lover, Radha or the other gopis are missing within the frames, while Krishna in this avatar is the doted son and idealized lover. The men in Rajasthan adopt traditional patriarchal roles, living in a homoerotic universe while mapping public terrains; the women live in private domains and play the nurturing role assigned within a hegemonic system. Gender segregation is the basis, on which an authentic masculine identity is acquired, here Krishna seems to be underpinning the idea that the “male psyche is constituted in a contradictory way through the strange combination of power and powerlessness, privilege and pain” (Michael Kaufmann).
While most photographs depict Krishna as a narcissistic, self absorbed individual, there is also an anguish that one notices in his expressions. Is there a crisis in masculinity? (Jeff Hearn) Does Krishna/the local male of Udaipur grapple with the duality of the domestic embodiment of the perfect son/provider versus the sexually aggressive male on the street, a psychosocial problem in outwardly conservative societies? Love/Sex become secret, desire is played out with passing wealthy tourists, gigolos and play-boys scour the tourist locations, creating erotic relations determined by economy and class. This series investigates the notion of desire as a structure or in a psychoanalytic way, the workings of the “libido” as a social force via the lens of the male universe, via a familiar historical Hindu god who is favoured amongst the populace, while a strange conflicted alterity plays out in a contingent mode. Via reclamation of, as he says, “a happy territory from regionalists”, Waswo inserts a provocative way to re-look at myth from within the realm of the contemporary. With much humour, Waswo casts a critical eye on the proximate transmission of historical traditions, modern aspirations of liberated sexual mores and the alienating aspects of a hegemonic patriarchal masculinity, examining how stories evolve with time, and mutate with interpretation.
Amrita Gupta-Singh
March 2010
Biography:
Amrita Gupta-Singh is an art historian and writer, with an interest in arts management. Currently, she is the Program Director at the Mohile Parikh Center, Mumbai and Fellow, Arthink South Asia 2010 -11.
