Happy Birthday Phoolan (left) | Caste and Food Series, Thecha (right)
Bao's digital art stems from the marginalisation she faced from the society. Hailing from the Dalit community, Bao strongly establishes the voice of her culture that is often overlooked in the mainstream digital art space and social media. Her work delves into the intersection of caste, gender, food, and contemporary politics. With bright colours and her vision of unabashedly telling stories of her roots and systematic marginalisation, Bao's art is an ode to the Dalit culture and history. In our conversation, she share how the current digital art scene both facilitates and limits her artistic pursuits.
Impact of Digital Art
Technology has definitely made experimentation, information, and techniques of creative production more accessible. However, I don’t think much has changed in terms of art, representation, access to art and creative production, art education, tacit knowledge, affordance, etc. When I was growing up and wanted to be a full-time artist, the cost of art supplies, access to education, cost of education in the field of arts and the sustenance in terms of livelihoods were extremely daunting aspects. After almost 2 decades, although digital art has empowered me to push my creativity, I still feel that access to art spaces, galleries, digital platforms, and experimenting with different media, has been as challenging as before. It has definitely enabled me to challenge traditional forms of art, combine other digital media, and has made possible for my work to have a much wider viewership. But I wouldn’t say it has impacted my life much, because I still begin my process with basic pencil/pen sketches in my sketchbook. So, whether it is my ipad or my sketchbook, there’s not much of a difference. I am, however, more concerned with being able to combine and experiment with different media because I find tacit knowledge far more superior and useful than explicit knowledge which usually comes from sticking to digital art alone.
The Anticaste Tarot Deck, Savitrimai (left) | Caste and Food Series, Lakuti (right)
The Question of Caste on Social Media
I’m honestly repulsed by the imagery that the internet is filled with. Whether it is photography or art, everything is either produced from the white cis het male gaze or from the Savarna gaze. Picture after picture is just bland, beige, boring, buffoonery produced by Savarnas/white people with absolutely no thought of reality. Everything is romanticized, fetishized, or glamorized… even poverty! In the Indian context, art spaces and practices conveniently erase the question of caste. So here I am, as an Intercaste Ambedkarite wanting to see the pain, the beauty, the struggles, the revolution, the movement, and the communities. In isolation, there are many artists from marginalized castes whose work is phenomenal and they are recognized and famous. However, we are all recognized as “Dalit Artists” and not just artists. Only Savarnas get to be label-free. Why is that? In order to find the answer to this question and many more such questions of representation and the function of art, I decided to explore more.
I’m honestly repulsed by the imagery that the internet is filled with. Whether it is photography or art, everything is either produced from the white cis het male gaze or from the Savarna gaze. Picture after picture is just bland, beige, boring, buffoonery produced by Savarnas/white people with absolutely no thought of reality. Everything is romanticized, fetishized, or glamorized… even poverty! In the Indian context, art spaces and practices conveniently erase the question of caste. So here I am, as an Intercaste Ambedkarite wanting to see the pain, the beauty, the struggles, the revolution, the movement, and the communities. In isolation, there are many artists from marginalized castes whose work is phenomenal and they are recognized and famous. However, we are all recognized as “Dalit Artists” and not just artists. Only Savarnas get to be label-free. Why is that? In order to find the answer to this question and many more such questions of representation and the function of art, I decided to explore more.
Where is the justice? (left) | Balipratipada 2023 (right)
Caste and Food
The project is part of my journey in documenting my experiences and childhood. Most of my memories around food, and those of my mother, are tainted with guilt, shame, and violence. From being shamed constantly for the food choices to being forced to look at food in a certain way, my illustrations highlight how caste has been fundamental in governing my relationship with food. There is violence, both personal and systemic, in addition to recipes and memories of taste, shame, guilt, and untouchability. These are foods that have never been illustrated before nor is the aesthetic “pinterest-worthy”.
Challenges of Being a Digital Artist
Challenges of Being a Digital Artist
It is still very difficult to be able to afford the luxuries of being a digital artist. I don’t understand how people feel that technology has democratized art. It really has not! If anything, it has made things worse. My work does not appeal to the algorithm which is heavily influenced by the white/Savarna visual language. So anything I make will remain within the small echo-chamber resulting from the kind of viewership I have. From affordance to access to digital infrastructure, funding, art galleries and platforms, and networks, everything is a big challenge. We’re not supported in any way nor do most of us artists from marginalized castes know how and where to access these things. Extremely mediocre Savarna artists who haven’t produced any significant work have been recognized and verified by tech giants but artists from marginalized castes with a significant contribution to the field of art and with a large viewership are either shadow banned or not recognized. Not that the verification badge or recognition from a white supremacist tech giant matters, but I want you to recognize how even if one is a digital artist, caste, gender, and class still determine our social standing in digital spaces.
Mahaparinirvan Din 2023
Dalit Representation in the Art Landscape
There is token representation peppered here and there because art institutions love to showcase how inclusive and diverse they are. However, we need more artists from all over the nation who represent their culture and community because “dalit” is not a monolithic identity. This can only happen when art, art education, the significance of art, and the process of creative production are greatly valued, stripped off casteism, and shifted away from capitalist lobbying. As much as the function of art is to reflect the direct aesthetic experiences of the real, it must nurture the spirit and provide ways of rethinking and healing generational wounds inflicted by assault from the vicious forces of casteism and patriarchy. There are a lot of things I wish to see changed in the field of art and one can only hope for these changes to happen with one’s own effort, determination, and assertion. Art spaces are way too sanitized and elite. We must free art from the clutches of casteism and capitalism. After all, as bell hooks rightly says, “art must be a space of defamiliarization where we abolish the conventional ways of thinking about the function of art. There must be revolution in the way we see and the way we look.”
There is token representation peppered here and there because art institutions love to showcase how inclusive and diverse they are. However, we need more artists from all over the nation who represent their culture and community because “dalit” is not a monolithic identity. This can only happen when art, art education, the significance of art, and the process of creative production are greatly valued, stripped off casteism, and shifted away from capitalist lobbying. As much as the function of art is to reflect the direct aesthetic experiences of the real, it must nurture the spirit and provide ways of rethinking and healing generational wounds inflicted by assault from the vicious forces of casteism and patriarchy. There are a lot of things I wish to see changed in the field of art and one can only hope for these changes to happen with one’s own effort, determination, and assertion. Art spaces are way too sanitized and elite. We must free art from the clutches of casteism and capitalism. After all, as bell hooks rightly says, “art must be a space of defamiliarization where we abolish the conventional ways of thinking about the function of art. There must be revolution in the way we see and the way we look.”
Words Paridhi Badgotri
Date 30.01.2024