Statement

An Indian from India

 As an immigrant, I am often questioned about where I am "really from." When I say that I am Indian, I often have to clarify that I am an Indian from India. Not an American-Indian, but rather an Indian-American, South-Asian Indian or even an Indian-Indian. It seems strange that all this confusion started because Christopher Columbus thought he had found India and called the native people of America collectively as Indians.

In this portfolio, I look at the other "Indian". I find similarities how Nineteenth century photographers of Native Americans looked at what they called the primitive natives, similar to the colonial gaze of the Nineteenth century British photographers working in India. In every culture there is the "other".

In this portfolio I play on my own "otherness", using photographs of Native Americans from the Nineteenth Century which perpetuate and reinforce stereotypes. The images highlight assimilation, use labels and make many assumptions. I pair these with self-portraits in clothes, poses and environments that mimic these "older" images. The clothes are also "made up", similar to Edward Curtis' intervention in his posing and dressing up of some of his subjects in his photographs. I challenge the viewers assumptions of then and now, us and them, exotic and local.

Bollywood Satirized

The digital portfolio, Bollywood Satirized, is a critical commentary on the societal expectations that I experienced as a woman growing up in India. To create this work, I start with Indian movie posters, a reflection of the popular culture and the melodrama of Indian life. The visual and aural presence of cinema in India is the result of the largest commercial film industry in the world that produces close to one thousand movies a year. Most of the film industry is concentrated in Bombay, which is also called "Bollywood."

Using digital technology to alter the Indian movie posters, I re-interpret the images to make blatantly satirical commentary and humorously challenge traditional gender roles and behavior in Indian society based on my experiences. The final images include myself, other imagery and text from other sources. As Deborah Frizzell in NY Arts 2001 wrote "The sensual, seductive medium of mass produced Indian movie posters of banal musicals are manipulated to send messages about the construction of feminine and racial roles by a patriarchal society."