Not just 'Dalit art': Artists bring nuance to caste tales

Recent years have seen the rise of voices rooted in anti-caste resistance, but they refuse to be bracketed as 'Dalit art'

- Avantika Bhuyan

At the Barbican, London, a recently concluded exhibition, The Imaginary Institution of India, featured nearly 150 artworks by over 30 artists done between the years 1975 and 1998, a period of drastic sociopolitical change in Indian history. The works "distilled historically significant episodes as well as intimate moments and shared experiences". Among the variety of mediums and themes on showcase were Savindra Sawarkar's potent etchings on themes of caste and untouchability.

Sawarkar has often been described as one of the first Indian gallery artists to "foreground the Dalit experience of caste as an aesthetic mode", as mentioned in a 2022 article in Scroll about his practice. He has, over time, created a unique vocabulary featuring Buddhist imagery and social symbols attached with caste. And yet, in the prime of his practice, between 1980s to early 2000s, Sawarkar showcased his work primarily with Lalit Kala Akademi's Garhi Studio in Delhi, outside of the private gallery scene.

"That was a time when art practices around anti-caste narratives were missing from the mainstream. Why did that happen? This is a question that we are still seeking answers to," says contemporary artist Vikrant Bhise, who tells stories of his personal experiences of caste politics and Ambedkarite consciousness.

Things have started changing slowly in the past decade-but not without effort. Suraj Yengde, author of Caste Matters and co-editor, The Radical in Ambedkar, in his 2023 essay Dalit Art, cites the example of Pramodbabu Ramteke, who experimented with art forms, "ultimately validating his subjects and themes through philosophical theories on Dalit life. Ramteke received a retrospective titled Open Mind at the National Gallery of Modern Art in Mumbai in 2021, which included over 250 artworks. It was the first time that a Dalit artist was recognized in this way, and it took four years of lobbying and fending off aspersions," he writes.