Crafting Knowledge and Knowledge of Crafts: Art Education, Colonialism and the Madras School of Arts in Nineteenth-Century South Asia A THESIS SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Deepali Dewan IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Frederick M. Asher, Adviser November 2001UMI Number: 3029085 UMI LUMI Microform 3029085 Copyright 2002 by Bell & Howell Information and Leaming Company. All rights reserved. This microform edition is protected against unauthorized copying under Title 17, United States Code. Bell & Howell Information and Learning Company 300 North Zeb Road P.O, Box 1346 ‘Ann Arbor, Mi 48106-1346© Deepali Dewan 2001UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA. This is to certify that I have examined this copy of a doctoral thesis by Deepali Dewan and have found that it is complete and satisfactory in all respects, ‘and that any and all revisions required by the final examining committee have been made. Frederick M. Asher Name of Faculty Adviser —s aT. Signature of Faculty Adviser Ni2G]eooy Date GRADUATE SCHOOL,ACKNOWLEDGMENTS Dissertation writing is like running a marathon that one never trains for. It is impossible to complete without the help of many along the way. First and foremost, I'd like to thank the Department of Art History at the University of Minnesota for giving me the opportunity to pursue my ideas and research in a supportive atmosphere. Also, I am deeply grateful to the Government College of Arts and Crafts, Chennai, without whose generosity, trust, and faith the research would not have been possible. In particular, 1 would like to thank Dr. Bhaskaran, Mr. V. Senguttuvan, Mr. Rajendran, Mr. Monoharan, Mr. G, Raman, Mr. K. C, Nagaraj, Mr. N. Radha Krishnan, and Mr. Dakshinamurti, Research was facilitated by fellowships from the Social Science Research Council, the American Institute of Indian Studies, the Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Global Change / MacArthur Program, the University of Minnesota Graduate School, and the College Art Association, Exploring the breadth and depth of colonial art education took me to a number of archival collections, among which the main ones were at the India Office Library and Records, the Victoria and Albert Museum, and the National Art Library (London); the Tamil Nadu Archives (Chennai); National Archives of India (Delhi); National Library (Calcutta); and the Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum. (Mumbai). I am thankful for the unfailing courtesy and assistance of the staff at these grant and research institutions, particularly Pradeep Mehendiratta and Purnima Mehta (AIIS Delhi); Dr. Pappu V. Rao (AIIS Chennai); Aditi Sen (AUIS Calcutta); Mr. Bhandare (AIS Pune); Bud Duvall, Allan Issacman, Jim Johnson, Claudia Shores, andii Karen Brown Thompson (MacArthur Program); John Falconer, Jennifer Howe, and Mrs. Kaltenhorn (India Office Library); Anthony Burton, Mark Hayward-Booth, Amin Jaffer, Graham Partlett, Divia Patel, and Susan Stronge (Victoria and Albert Museum, London); Mr. M, Sundararajan (Tamil Nadu State Archives); A. Ghatak, Dipali Ghosh, and Ashim Mukherjee (National Library, Calcutta); and Mr. Jyotish Desai and Mrs. Suman D. Thate (Dr. Bhau Daji Lad Museum, Mumbai). Along the way, conversations with and assistance provided by Sharon Apparao (Apparao Galleries, Chennai), Mr. Balasubramanyam and Mr. Rangami (Government Museum, Chennai), Dr. Bhattacharya, Biman Das (Calcutta School of Arts), Tapati Guha-Thakurta, Dr. Ingle (Sir J. J. School of ‘Art, Mumbai), J. Kedareswari (Salar Jung Museum, Hyderabad), Raju Bandu Lokhande (State Central Library, Mumbai), Mr. Dilip Medadkar (Mahatma Phule Vastu Sangrahlaya Museum, Pune), Partha Mitter, Sachidananda Mohanty (American Studies Research Center, Osmania University, Hyderabad), Mr. Muthiah, Dr. Ranade (Raja Kelkar Museum, Pune), Dr. Ray (Victoria Memorial, Calcutta), and Gopika Varma, helped immensely. I was able to bear the solitary hours of research due to the generous friendship and comraderie of many. I would like to thank Rodney and Crystal Easdon, Kalpalatika, Maheswari, Colonel Nandan Nilakanta, and V. Srinivasan in Chennai; Vijay and Asha Wadhwani and Family in Mumbai; Shree Gopal and Usha Rajgharia and Family in Delhi; and Zarina Bhimji in London. In particular, my deep gratitude goes to K. Srinivas for photography, transportation, and friendship. Times with him and his family fed both body and soul. Also, to my good friend Rick Weiss, for the distra ms and good friendshipiti across nation/state lines. Finally, to my family for opening their homes and their hearts during my travels, there is no sufficient expression of gratitude: Deepak Dewan, Usha Dewan, Payal Dewan, Priya Dewan, Bhaskhar Dewan, Subodh Goyal, Alka Goyal, Sonal Goyal, Ashish Goyal, and the extended Goyal family, General Vinod and Arati Krishna, Anand and Indu Krishna, Jyoti Charan, and Usha Gupta. Dissertation writing requires much sacrifice, the least of which are the faded letters on my computer keyboard. Fortunately or unfortunately, I have not had to bear these alone. I am grateful for the constant support and friendship of my colleagues in art history, particularly Rebecca Brown, Sharon Littlefield, Monolina Bhattacharya, and Debby Hutton, who have been present since the beginning of this journey. Also to Carla Vogel, for a lifetime of friendship, Monika Mehta, who seems to be there at just the right time, and Latha Varadarajan for chai and adda, in the past and in the future. Others without whom this would have been a much more painful process include: Debbie, Ravi, Sophia, and Maya Charan for endless hours of laughter, love, and good bedtime stories, also Rebecca Bacchman, Bharat Charan, Nina Cichocki, Mohamed Dukuly, Greta Friedman-Sanchez, Kemi Ilescnmi, Jennifer Joffee, Hawon Kim, and Kristy Phillips To my committee—Frederick Asher, Catherine Asher, Gloria Goodwin Raheja, Robert Silberman, and Qadri Ismail—1 owe a profound debt of gratitude for performing, the Herculean task of reading the dissertation in a limited time span and for theit constant support and encouragement, both intellectually and emotionally. To my adviser, Frederick Asher, I want to express special thanks for giving me the trust and the space to explore a range of ideas within and beyond the boundaries of art history, and for knowingiv the delicate balance between adviser and friend. To Gloria Goodwin Raheja, whose energy, humanity, and scholarship continue to inspire me, I am grateful for many years of encouragement, mentorship, and friendship. The last few weeks of the dissertation process were not easy. I thank Debby Hutton, Lisa Anderson-Levy, Gabrielle Valdivia, and Clayton Cobb for acting as my personal reserve forces called in for last minute proofreading. I am also deeply thankful to Clayton Cobb for his gentle and enduring affection and support as we grow, learn, and continue to share more and more of our lives together. Finally, there are no words to convey my gratitude for the unconditional love and support over the years of my parents, Anil and Barbara Dewan, and siblings Naina Dewan and Arjun Dewan, They are my strength, my laughter, my light. I welcome into the family my sister-in-law, Rachel Dewan, whose light-heartedness eased the final months of writing, The final stage of this dissertation was written during the events of September 11" and their aftermath. During this period, when the alarming effects of U.S. foreign policy in a global system that it helped produce were becoming increasingly clear, the worthiness of spending time examining nineteenth-century art education came into serious question in my mind. My deep appreciation to the MacArthur Program for showing me that a critical examination of the past is relevant to contemporary events and that academic research and activism can be intimately linked.Itis obvious that the archive of a society, a culture, or a civilization cannot be described exhaustively; or even, no doubt, the archive of a whole period. On the other hand, it is not possible ‘for us to describe our own archive, since itis from within these rules that we speak, since it is that which gives to what we can say—and to itself, the object of our discourse—its modes of appearance, its forms of existence and coexistence, its system of accumulation, historicity, and disappearance. The archive cannot be described in its totality; and in its presence it is unavoidable. ~ Michel Foucault, The Archaeology of Knowledge, 1969; Trans., 1972, 130. “Everything has shape, if you look for it. There is no escape from form.”” ~- Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children, 1980, 271