Environmental Art Histories of South Asia

Undergraduate / Graduate

How can art history contribute to the ongoing discourse about environmentalism? What can the study of art tell us about the inter-relatedness of human creativity and the environment? In this seminar, we will wrestle with these questions through an ecocritical study of South Asian art. South Asian art is fundamentally marked by an interest in nature. The towers of Indian temples were conceived of as physical manifestations of the Himalayas. Temple doors often include anthropomorphic depictions of the rivers Ganga and Yamuna. Animals and birds are active agents in major Indian epics. Forests drew in meditating mystics, exiled princes, forlorn lovers. The ocean, capricious and vast, was a thing to fear. In the seminar we will look at the environment and its depiction in art. In considering the two together, we will ask: How did the natural environment shape and affect the arts? What significance can the arts have when the environment that gave it meaning is in danger of vanishing? We live in a time of unparalleled environmental crisis. While scientific disciplines have traditionally been at the forefront of describing our transforming environment, the present crisis calls on us to rethink all forms of scholarly discourse to offer a holistic view of the problems we face. To that end, an ecocritical approach allows us to rethink how humans have coexisted with the environment, and can, perhaps, offer a way forward.