University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

botched aesthetics: Indian identity and respresentation

(USC Thesis Other)

botched aesthetics: Indian identity and respresentation

PDF

Download a page range

Download transcript

Copy asset link

Request this asset

Transcript (if available)

Content

botched aesthetics
Indian Identity and Representation

by

Vrinda Aggarwal

A Thesis Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC ROSKI SCHOOL OF ART AND DESIGN
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In Partial Fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF FINE ARTS

May 2023

COPYRIGHT 2023 Vrinda Aggarwal

TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Figures…………………………………………………………………………………….iii
Abstract...........................................................................................................................................iv
Introduction......................................................................................................................................1
Chapter One: Nationalism and Nostalgia: Colonial to Contemporary India...................................5
Chapter Two: Identity and Aesthetics............................................................................................14
Chapter Three: Critical Aunty Studies...........................................................................................21
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................24
Bibliography..................................................................................................................................25

iii

List of Figures
Figure 1. This Our India, Pramod Pati………….………………………………………………..13
Figure 2: Untitled, Vrinda Aggarwal…………………………………………………………….22
Figure 3: Somewhere Between a Self-Portrait and a CV, Vrinda Aggarwal…………...………..23

iv

Abstract
botched aesthetics is a term that Indian curator Yamini Telkar uses to evaluate the forms of
cultural expression that have evolved as the result of a long and complex history of colonization.
The idea of botched aesthetics suggests that India, as a nation, has internalized the framework
and ideals of modernity that come from Euro-American culture but in a distorted or “botched”
way. My work, and this thesis, explore not only the ideas of identity, nationalism, colonialism,
and collective memory that underpin botched aesthetics but also the subversive potential they
have in practice.

1

Introduction
Indian curator Yamini Telkar, in a talk in December 2021, describes the aesthetics of
India as “botched” as a function of its colonial past. She argues that if you have internalized the
values of another country, culture, or nation-state, then your cultural expression and aesthetics
will always be botched. This occurs because cultural expression itself, as a nation, or a unified
identity, is shaped by the effects of colonialism. The same colonialist frameworks and ideals of
success apply to the systems and structures that uphold nationhood or national identity. This
includes the way the cultural expression is perceived as well. The range of ethnicities, cultures,
and religions within India's boundaries is attributed to the citizens within the country under the
narrative of nationalist pride in “unity in diversity.” This range of cultural exchange, access and
appropriation throughout the country blurs boundaries and challenges categorization but also
reifies them. Bollywood is probably the best example of this. The mainstream Indian film
industry out of Mumbai which produces movies that take on the culture and aesthetics of states
from all over the country. What makes it botched is the amalgamation of cultures where a
Punjabi singer can sing a song in a Hindi movie paying an ode to a famous south Indian actor.
Whereas this can be considered an example of diversity and cultural exchange, such content can
reinforce stereotypes as the creators of it are upper caste. In the context of globalization, this
complicated history troubles what can be categorized as Indian and who has access to and ability
to represent it. Analyzing such an amalgamation of cultures and rejecting binaries to represent a
more nuanced understanding botches the dominant aesthetic.
In considering aesthetics, Amrit Gangar, in his book, Cinema of Prayoga, rightly states,
“[t]he Euro-American establishment can still only assimilate non-western art on manifestly

2

ethnographic terms, keeping the option to reject it precisely on those terms.”
1
The concept of
botched aesthetics suggests that the dominant groups in India follow a similar pattern in
evaluating art and aesthetics. That craft is unique to particular regions or communities that are
appropriated. For example, dance forms, such as Bharatnatyam, used to be unique to
communities and passed down through generations. However, upper-caste communities were not
allowed to practice dance forms. With British interest and appreciation for the dance, upper-caste
women began to practice the form. The Shringar Ras, or the aspect of the dance about love and
sexuality, was taken away from the form because it was considered improper for the upper caste
women.
The above example elucidates the complex history and forces that impact what is
represented. botched aesthetics, as a framework that aims to create a self-aware understanding of
aesthetic evaluation and critique in the space of hypervisibility, information overload, and
globalization. In defining botched aesthetics, I would cite the example of Amrit Ganger, who
writes about the idea of a “mature humanism”
2
while describing the work of Indian artists Nalini
Malani and Tushar Joag in their use of grotesque imagery where “meaning cannot be based on
stable or grand narratives that the critical image requires an ongoing dynamic relation of the
artist to the viewer of looking, questioning and critiquing. A discourse to discover temporarily
values by re-telling our life stories in a mediated environment.”
3

1
Brad Butler, Karen Mirza, and Amrit Ganger, Cinema of Prayoga: Indian Experimental Film and
Video, 1913-2006 (London: No.w.here, 2007), 19.
2
Ibid., 32.

3
Brad Butler, Karen Mirza, and Amrit Ganger, Cinema of Prayoga: Indian Experimental Film and Video,
1913-2006 (London: No.w.here, 2007).32.

3

botched aesthetics involves the active negotiation of the postcolonial circumstances of,
India. Through this framework, we can question Western ways of thinking, in particular, the
limits of representation, the idea of the possibility of perfect knowledge, the concept of linear
time, and the pressures of modernity. In this paper, by outlining the history of India in relation to
nationalism and defining the value of India as a nation, I explore the relationship between Indian
nationhood and my experience of being a transnational student, originally from India, now in
America in the twenty-first century.
Gangar’s model of culture is useful to my understanding of botched aesthetics. The
globalization of media, information, and discourse leads to the creation of what Gangar calls a
“memory membrane” where foreign images, including those of cartoons, tv shows, and news as
well as war, violence and cruelty in the world are embedded as collective memory.
4
Because of
this, location and context become crucial ideas which people hold on to. As a way of making
sense of their identity and value in a global human context. Within this context, Gangar poses
counter cultural and critical art as an intentional lie to create new truths, especially through
images. Given the collective memory membrane and dynamic re-telling of stories, the aesthetics
evolve, appropriate other elements, and continue to morph, distort, and botch sources and
frameworks. By confusing the boundaries between “source” and “copy” (in this case, colonizer
culture and post-colonial India), botched aesthetics also seek to trouble the dualistic narratives
and paradigms of the West versus the rest.
Anita Dube’s Kissa-e-Noor Mohammed (Garam Hawa) 2004, shows a Muslim man begins
speaking conversationally, as though he is speaking to his artist friend:
I tell all my artist friends also, that in these times, this voice of your

4
Brad Butler, Karen Mirza, and Amrit Ganger, Cinema of Prayoga: Indian Experimental Film and Video,
1913-2006 (London: No.w.here, 2007).32

4

conscience in which you take so much pride, your Art, is nothing or as
small as an ant, and can be crushed and controlled easily by the bigger
art of politics. And Art cannot comprehend the spectacular power of the
grotesque public art project, which is fascism. Well, we are living in
dark times, and we can see this disease spreading all around us, and my
friends tell me that even the art world is not spared its influence.
5

However, the video ends with the man being Anita Dube herself dressed up as the Muslim man.
How she is dressed is important as it is a religious signifier in a country with a history of
communal violence. It raises the question of representation as the artist herself, as her last name
suggests, is of an upper-caste Hindu background. This video, becomes an example of a botched
aesthetic; it is complex and self-aware in its understanding as it sheds light on the inevitable
hypocrisy of the art world.

5
Brad Butler, Karen Mirza, and Amrit Ganger, Cinema of Prayoga: Indian Experimental Film and
Video, 1913-2006 (London: No.w.here, 2007).19.

5

Chapter 1: Nationalism and Nostalgia: Colonial to Contemporary India
When I was younger, my father would tell me about the science behind Hinduism and
Hindu religious practices. He calls the Hindu religion a non-missionary religion that does not
need to impose itself on others as Christianity or Islam does. He would say: “We are descendants
of the Aryan race that established themselves in the Indus Valley civilization; Hinduism is a
polytheistic religion that seeks to teach its followers rather than engaging in forced conversions.”
Here you see him creating an evaluation of his own culture and beliefs in reference and
comparison to the British imposition of missionaries in India. By doing so, he makes a moral
judgment that values self-determinism and secularism. For him, this also highlights the hypocrisy
of the message of the superiority and civilization of the white man. However, he uses the same
tactic to assert the validity of his identity. He would ask me, “have you read the Hanuman
Chalisa? Do you know that the chants of this particular prayer map the exact distance from the
Earth to the Sun? And the British and the West think they are advanced and have these
spaceships that have only recently been able to understand that distance.” In these comments to
me, there is a “nostalgic desire”
6
that my father expressed for a time before British rule, a time
when his fellow countrymen were not subjugated. And in that imagination, he pictures his
country and himself within his country as “successful and advanced” in the linear evolution and
progressive model of time that wealthier Western nations supposedly enjoy.

6
Svetlana Boym, "Nostalgia and Its Discontents,” The Hedgehog Review: Essays on Contemporary
Culture (Summer 2007), available online at: https://hedgehogreview.com/issues/the-uses-of-the-
past/articles/nostalgia-and-its-discontents
She continues to describe “the nostalgic desires to turn history into private or collective mythology, to
revisit time like space, refusing to surrender to the irreversibility of time that plagues the human
condition.” [she does not use italics so you shouldn’t either unless you want to italicize in which case you
should note [this author’s italics] after the footnote.

6

Svetlana Boym describes this phenomenon as an example of restorative nostalgia that is
focused on the idea of “nostos (home) and attempts a transhistorical reconstruction of a lost
home.”
7
She continues by suggesting that this nostalgia thinks of itself as “truth and tradition,”
that it is a
national memory that is based on a single version of national identity, on
the one hand, and social memory, which consists of collective frameworks
that mark, but do not define individual memory on the other hand. The
rhetoric of restorative nostalgia is not about “the past” but rather about
universal values, family, nature, homeland, truth.
8

This restoration of the past through a nostalgic lens is accepted as the truth; it is a result of
nationalism and feelings of pride in the potential of the great nation of India, but it also produces
and reinforces nationalism. The nationalism, as can be seen with the Hindutva movement
through the ideas of nostalgia and creating a “Hindu Rashtra” or “Hindu Nation.”
As feminist post-colonial Indian/American theorist Gayatri Spivak has argued in her
2014 article “Nationalism and the Imagination,” “[t]he identity of the nation and the state is
generally associated with the Peace of Westphalia (1648), often thought of as one of the
inaugurations of the Enlightenment.”
9
Within this framework of the nation-state developed
within Europe, the achievement of freedom by the nation in 1947, with Jawaharlal Nehru as the
country's first Prime Minister, is considered the nation's birth. It is important to note that Nehru’s
desire for the country was to rid India of its backwardness. He was particularly fascinated with

7
Ibid.
8
Ibid.
9
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. “Nationalism and the Imagination.” Critical studies (Amsterdam,
Netherlands) 37 (2014): 31–55.

7

the lifestyle and social ideals of the United Kingdom and promoted these values to uplift his
fellow countrymen. Partha Chatterjee, in his 2022 book, The Truth and Lies of Nationalism,
points out the mythical nature of the idea of the monolith of India as a unified nation, pointing
out, instead, that it was a land that was meant to have a diversity of people and culture.
10
The
nationalist fantasy of a unified India glosses over that India exists as a unified nation due to
colonialism. A narrative of unity in diversity is key when thinking about Indian nationalism.
Even though there are twenty-seven states, each with its own identity and unique culture, the
governments since 1947 seek to present or pull together the country as unified.
To understand the formation of Indian nationalism in relation to its former colonizer, the
UK, it is instructive to examine a cultural product from the transitional period away from direct
colonization (India having won its independence in 1947). Pramod Pati’s documentary-style
animation, This Our India (1960), begins by defining the features of the country, noting that it is
the seventh largest country in the world.
11
There is a sense of pride and praise in the way he
illustrates the country's physical features; for example, the narrator continues on to note, “the
face of our land has three marked features, the high mountain ranges of the Himalayas with some
of the tallest mountains in the world.” If it were about the individual alone, the pronouns would
be “you/your.” Here the “our” subsumes the individual into the nation. He refers to the longest
river as the “holy Ganga.” The river is considered according to Hinduism. Its holiness showcases
the proximity of the religious and national identities among the majority. It is important to note
that the film’s voiceover is in English, not in a native language. The speaker also speaks in a
neutral or almost British upper-class accent pronouncing the word tall as “ta-wl” with a soft “T.”

10
Partha Chatterjee, The Truths and Lies of Nationalism as Narrated by Charvak (Albany, New York: State
University of New York, 2022).
11
Pramod Pati, This Our India (Films Division , 1960), available online at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_oS1fNhOcg .

8

Within the context of India, where the British colonizers consistently maintained positions of
power, this accent functions to establish the narrator as an authority figure. This shows how
limited the scope and audience for the film are, as the ability to speak English, specifically with
an upper-class British accent, is a signifier of education. Education would have been limited to
urban areas and more wealthy or at least middle-class Indians, especially when the film came
out. The film highlights the diversity of natural resources, including agricultural and mining
potential. It portrays how well connected the country is through the land, water, and air—proving
India’s “modernity.”
Toward the end of the video, the speaker describes how seventy percent of the country is
in rural areas and showcases cartoons of two types of males. The uneven ratio of rural to urban
suggests that the people in rural areas are more numerous but also aligns them with faceless
crowds. Pati equates one educated man who lives in the city wearing glasses as a signifier of an
ability to read. As seen in the image representing India’s rural population, the men are shown
without shoes and have darker skin color and messier hair. The colorism in the image is evident
and has deep roots in Indian culture. The image of the educated fair-skinned man is made in the
image of the British white male. It signifies the reality of also how being outdoors in the sun
daily leads to an individual having darker skin. In contrast, the individual indoors engaging in
intellectual labor is fairer, sitting in positions of power that reach dominance through politics and
industry—accumulating power and influence in the same way as Western capitalism. The
amalgamation of British classism and the Indian caste system creates a system within which

9

people are considered and positioned as “botched’ versions of the ideal type.

Figure 1. This Our India, Pramod Pati, Film Still, 1960
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_oS1fNhOcg&t=414s

The tone of the film is riddled with the paradox of modern nostalgia. The consistent use
of the term “our land” suggests a universality, a merging of the individual into the nation-state;
this relates to Boym’s description of the paradox of modern nostalgia: “the universality of its
longing can make us more empathetic towards fellow humans, and yet the moment we try to
repair that longing with a particular belonging—or the apprehension of loss with a rediscovery of
identity and especially of a national community and unique and pure homeland— we often part
ways with others and put an end to mutual understanding.”
12
This universality and restorative
nostalgic desire become analogous to colonial narratives of social transformation. Within

12
Boym, 9

10

nationalism in India, it becomes the responsibility of the upper class to educate and drive
“forward” the nation. This leads to nostalgia mixed with nationalism becoming “prospective,” in
Boym’s argument, wherein: “The fantasies of the past, determined by the needs of the present,
directly impact the realities of the future. Considering the future makes us take responsibility for
our nostalgic tales.”
13
The common narrative that India should have uplifting national narratives
is connected to colonization. Chaitanya Sambrani, while in an article about the artist Tushar
Joag’s work, defines this phenomenon.
The goal of social transformation through infrastructural adjustment has been part of
Indian state policy since Independence. Founded on faith in the ideal of progress,
successive generations of political and administrative leaders have designed and
implemented strategies for the greater common good, even though the human cost has, at
times, been severe. Varieties of social engineering with different degrees of compulsion
have been the primary task of the nation-state in the developing world. The long-
cherished ideal of social engineering is based on faith in an essentially benevolent state
apparatus that performs its actions, not for the sake of power or to benefit those already
privileged but for the betterment of all its citizens. Specifically, in terms of Third World
Politics, the nation undertakes these operations on behalf of the least empowered among
the population as an antidote to social Darwinism.
14
The quote showcases the survival of the fittest mentality. However, the tendency to attribute
economic success of the few to the whole country often masks the exploitation that occurs. In her
2011 book, Broken Republic, Arundhati Roy gives an example of this exploitation when she

13
Boym. 8
14
Sambrani, Chaitanya. “Tushar Joag, Willing Suspension .” criticalcollective.in. Accessed December 15,
2022. https://criticalcollective.in/ArtistInner2.aspx?Aid=133&Eid=62.

11

describes the people of Kondh in India who worshiped the mountains they lived in.
15
They
believed that these mountains were their protectors. However, these mountains were cut down
for the mining of bauxite. The Kondh people were displaced and forced to move to crowded
cities, including my hometown New Delhi. The ones who defended themselves were branded as
terrorists. Someone had to pay the price of progress.
The Indian film industry presumes access to culture and cultural labor associated with
Indian identity. In his 2019 book, Cultural Labour: Conceptualizing the “Folk Performance” in
India, Brahma Prakash describes the song “Munni Badnaam Hui” (Little Girl got infamous in the
form of shame or gets a bad name), from the famous 2010 Bollywood movie Dabangg.
16
The
song was appropriated from a song from the state of Uttar Pradesh called “Launda Bdnaam
Hua,” which awkwardly translates to boy gets infamous in the as due to a shameful act or getting
a bad name or reputation. On the one hand, Prakash argues that it would be acceptable in upper-
caste families to dance to a song that sexualizes a female. It is acceptable for the female to face
the male gaze of desire and disgust. The shamed woman in a society with bad morals is
acceptable imagery to dance to. On the other hand, the actual song is culturally shocking because
it sexualizes the man and portrays him in a feminine light. Prakash argues that this challenges the
masculinity of the upper-caste Hindu male and, therefore, would not be acceptable. Such a
judgment is inherently caste-ist and classist because it looks down on the people who create
music that creates this aesthetic.
In the case of the song, Munni Badnaam Hui, the Bollywood industry took an originally
Bhojpuri song and altered it to a framework that works for them. This is a clear example of a

15
Arundhati Roy , “Mr. Chidambaram's War ,” in Broken Republic (Penguin Books , n.d.), pp. 3-24.
16
Brahma Prakash, Cultural Labour: Conceptualizing the “Folk Performance” in India
(Oxford: Oxford UP, 2019)1-52

12

botched aesthetic as it is an alteration of an original to fit a purpose. It would be reductive to say
that the girl being shamed is not looked down on. According to Prakash, the upper class and
caste manage to shame yet view such performances without having to associate themselves with
it. However, find ways to respect artistic labor within their own communities.
Prakash also discusses the concept of grotesque imagery that is part of folk cultural
performances. He suggests that the grotesque imagery makes sense to take place within the
community within which the grotesque imagery is relevant due to its specificity and context. In
their 2015 article, “In Defense of Representation,” Tristan Garcia suggests that “representations
do not exist in truth except for those things that they represent.”
17
Prakash suggests that the
grotesque imagery, when perceived by audiences outside the community for which it is intended,
can be misinterpreted.
Svetlana Boym argues that with the advent of globalization, the question of place and
desire for belonging is exacerbated. She suggests that “[t]he nostalgic is never a native, but rather
a displaced person who mediates between the local and the universal.”
18
Artist Sonia Khurana in
her work The World (2007), addresses her grandmother’s journey to the city of Meerut in India
from her home in Lahore during the Partition of India in 1947. Khurana introduces the idea that
her grandmother had to essentially build a new home due to the displacement she faced. Khurana
also suggests that nation and national identity in India are a construct rather than a natural
occurrence. Conversely, Ganger argues that while thinking about art that comes “from” India,
this art does not have to contain specific essentialist characteristics defining Indian culture. The

17
Tristan Garcia, “In Defense of Representation,” Realism Materialism Art, ed. Christoph Cox, Jenny
Jaskey & Suhail Malik (Sternberg Press, 2015), 245-251.
18
Boym, 12.

13

definition of work from India is about various perspectives on subjective local cultures and
aesthetics.
While illustrating and interpreting this idea of botched aesthetics, it is important to look
at the position that I, as a writer and subject for this framework, come from. The writing is an
attempt at making meaning out of personal experiences and locating the self and also my art.
From here on this text takes on a more casual tone, analyzing the mundane aspects of life that
inevitably contribute to patterns and narratives in the creative work. As an upper-caste Hindu
individual representative of the majority community in India with a western education and
English as my primary language, I explore how this makes me produce work that has a botched
aesthetic.

14

Chapter Two: Identity and Aesthetics
Internalized Racism:
There are two ways: trying to convert yourself into this other. For example, as they
evolve, the geometry of architecture, structure, the dominance of the English language, apparel,
and of course, fair skin, i.e., western beauty standards. For example, in yoga: you take a sure
thing, repackage it, and sell it back to the same people; it sells. The west provides a standard that
also validates.
However, due to American discourses on racism, in one way, there is cultural value in the
performance of identity. As an Indian living in the United States, the performance of my identity
has cultural capital. Color as capital, but only in America. It is what you find yourself using to
keep parts yourself that you potentially took for granted. Something as mundane as the act of
eating Indian food often becomes a ritual for the celebration of culture when with my
community, or it becomes a space for showcasing and sharing my identity with those outside of
it.
Performative Identity:
As a diasporic subject, my identity immediately becomes a performance. My experiences
are automatically linked to the fact that I am foreign. I am “from” a different place, drawing a
constant comparison between here and what it is like “back” home. I am aware of the space I
take because my language and accent often distort my understanding of what I say. The onus of
being properly understood falls to me. My identity is something that I get to construct.
My identity and experience are novel in the Western art world context. I am inevitably
associated with where I come from, therefore, positioning me in relation to my cultural identity.
This dynamic works in my favor, with my Indianness functioning as socio-cultural capital. What

15

parts interest the American, Californian, Angeleno, academic, and art audiences? I automatically
exist on the margin of a margin.
How much agency do I have in how I am perceived? Do I have agency? What do I
choose to highlight that will work in my favor? How differently do I have to act with peers or
strangers?
My performance of identity starts with small things like saying “water” (American
accent) at restaurants and retail shops or when I’m asking for it. But “water” (British
pronunciation) when I’m talking like this in conversation when I am talking about water. The
automatic code-switching where my water might turn into water (wah-tur if I am predominantly
surrounded by people that speak in American accents).
Identity becomes a force to fight against or renegotiate constantly. As a diasporic subject,
in between cultures, there is an awareness of how you take space and are being perceived
because there is more room for error and loss in translation, even if the predominant language is
English.
Oranges
The film Oranges is shot in the visible landscapes of Los Angeles. The landscapes are
essential to the shooting of the film. These narratives about the Western world, or even America
in particular, are related to the idea of the US as the promised land, a more advanced world with
more scope for growth. Images of oranges growing in the wintertime were used in
advertisements as a selling point for California. The film explores the manifestation of

16

prospective nostalgia,
19
the nostalgia of the upper-caste Hindu man who has imbibed the colonial
and capitalist value of the West in the way he seeks success. He aims to achieve the imagined
status and power of the white man and prove his value within that framework. The film explores
the nature of that desire for an ideal world where he is equal to Westerners in the success that he
achieves.
Author Jessica Gaitán Johannesson in her book Nerves and their Ending, focuses on the
environment and activism, connecting the personal to the political. While considering the carbon
footprint of a human being, she writes.
everything an individual consumes (that banana rather than an innocent
turnip), how it gets from one place to another (are you flying home for
Christmas?), the space it takes up in the world (are tiny homes and ‘micro
houses’ the answer?) gains significance when you realize – as in, make
emotionally real – the connection between your way of life and the risk of
societal collapse that you do not end with your physical boundaries. Your
nerves stretch beyond what is visibly yours.
20

In my thesis exhibition, leave out, I consider materials, particularly cast-off or discarded
materials, as extensions of my body, how I take space and move through the world. What ties
each of the materials together is that they are all a function of my body or materials that I use
daily. I am particularly interested in how deeply the material world is embedded into our
personal lives. I seek to bring awareness to what is routine to be thrown out or discarded.
Collecting this material helps us understand what is being consumed during the day.

19
Boym
20
Johannesson Jessica Gaitán, “'What Have I Done?' and Other Illusions of Control,” in The
Nerves and Their Endings: Essays on Crisis and Response (Brunswick, Victoria: Scribe
Publications, 2022), p. 9.

17

The description of the exhibition reads
As yet another transplant in Los Angeles, Aggarwal explores identity
construction, considering the discourse of representation and aesthetic
value. The exhibition charts the hybridization that comes from
displacement, thinking through the negotiation of what you bring to a new
home, what you leave behind, and what you throw away.
Using mundane objects and liminal spaces as materials, the work
interrogates what fades into the background and what is accepted as
routine. Creating daily rituals and rules for collecting materials to locate the
self and meaning-making is analogous to mindfulness practice. Through
the exhibition, she seeks to create an ongoing space for acceptance,
embracing simultaneity, hybridity, and even failure. [indent both sides]

Waste is inevitably linked to consumption, which has environmental implications. Being
mindful of your trash and storing it is also a function of your ability to do so and the space you
have. Also, the ability to throw away your waste and not have to deal with it because it is hidden.
However, the politics of waste and its link to colonialism and so on is something that goes
beyond the scope of this paper. Leave out is a starting point for the consideration and awareness
of waste.
The collection of my waste materials such as my hair, cardboard boxes, and trash bags.
The question that remains is about sustainability. Since the materials that I am using are meant to
be discarded, they are not being recycled. The aesthetic of leave out relies on appropriation, and
the plastic or disposable quality of the material (or lack thereof) is evident. The installation of
the work and formal display leads to the creation of more waste material. Some of the waste
material from the installation process itself is included in the show as a pile, which also
surrounds and almost covers a projector. This waste pile includes paper and plastic that were not

18

included in certain pieces of the exhibition due to time constraints or to manage the size of the
work. It also has blue tape, duct tape, gaffers tape, vinyl remains, the paper used for vinyl, and
plastic wrappers from art supplies.

Figure 2. Untitled, Vrinda Aggarwal (Photograph by Chris Hanke) paper, blue tape, vinyl, plastic
dimensions variable, 2023, USC Roski School of Art and Design

The work, Somewhere Between a Self Portrait and a CV, is installed and hanging above
the heads of the viewers. It consists of my discarded paper, including bills, predominantly from
groceries or art supplies, expired immigration documents, covid test results, syllabi, handouts
from classes, drafts from scripts that I have written, test printouts of images and so on. The
paper is then dipped in coffee to make the pages uniform in color. The piece is inspired by

19

Tracey Emin’s work Cunt Vernacular (1997), where, in a single shot, she showcases her entire
apartment. In the voice-over, she lists her sexual experiences, stamping them by year to enhance
the idea of a curriculum vitae. The work was originally titled Curriculum Vitae but then changed
to highlight this format of a personal narrative. The listing of personal experiences from which
the viewer could draw inferences was particularly interesting. The formal nature of the narration
and the detailed description of something as personal as text, when put on display, creates
tension. It makes the viewer intensely aware of the intimate details of Emin’s experiences of
sexual pleasure but also of trauma and abuse. Emin creates a space for such contrasting
experiences to coexist, manifesting into a self-portrait.

Figure 3. Somewhere Between a Self-Portrait and a CV, Vrinda Aggarwal (Photograph by Chris Hanke)
Watercolor on found paper, Dimensions variable, 2023, USC Roski School of Art and Design

20

Somewhere between a Self Portrait and a CV, does the same. The thread comes through
the formal elements and material. The paper, although eclectic, is dyed in coffee.
On the paper, anywhere with text or any other visual reference is painted over with black paint.
The paint marks function as a redaction. The text remains readable; however, you must look
closely at the paper curtain above your head. Only some things in the text are legible. The work
is ongoing and re-creatable. It functions as a signifier of the time it was created and is based on
the paper I could collect and include when the piece was being made.

21

Chapter Three: Critical Aunty Studies
Critical Aunty Studies is a space to look at the framework of botched aesthetics. The
wordplay in the scholarship space showcases a humanist self-awareness intended with botched
aesthetics. Bimbola Akinbola, in their 2022 article “#AfricanAunties: Performing Diasporic
Digital Disbelongings on TikTok,” refers to this idea of a perpetual state of failure for females in
the domestic space amongst their families, which leads to a continuous cycle of striving and
failure towards an unachievable objective.
21
She attributes this to the face of the myth of the
model woman. I argue that this holds for Indian aunties as well. Indian aunties are gatekeepers of
the idea of the proper female, standards which they uphold through the soft social power they
wield within hierarchical family structures. At the same time, aunties challenge hetero-
patriarchal family structures through continued information dissemination. Where information,
which can even exist in the form of gossip can go a long way in informing the behaviors of those
around them. What makes this botched is the simultaneous use of shame yet feminist power.
The term aunty is complicated and botched in India because it indicates a woman of a
certain age. In the 2015 Bollywood movie Dil Dhadakne Do, for example, we see a group of
aunties gossiping in a cooking class, discussing the lives of their respective children and making
judgments on compatibility and merit.
22
The young female protagonist is unhappy with the
judgments that they are making because they have implications for her love interest. She barges
into the conversation, frustrated by what she has overheard, and exclaims, “Don’t you have
anything better to do? Leave your kids alone and do something with your life. Get a job.” One of

21
Bimbola Akinbola, “#Africanaunties: Performing Diasporic Digital Disbelongings on TikTok,” Text
and Performance Quarterly 42, no. 3 (2022): 284–97. https://doi.org/10.1080/10462937.2022.2044071.
22
Dil Dhadakne Do . Film. India : Excel Entertainment, Junglee Pictures, 2015.

22

the aunties chuckles in a quirky manner, looking around at her friends and laughing, saying, “Are
you crazy? Who in the world would give us a job?” This scene reveals a multitude of complex
understandings. The protagonist is dismissive of the value and place of aunties and their labor
within the household, which might occur in their roles as mothers, aunts, and wives. She is quick
to look down on them due to their age and potential lack of the kind of traditional education their
spouses might have had. Yet she is aware of their influence and is concerned with the
implications that it might have for her.
On the other hand, the aunties are self-aware and used to not having their labor and
caregiving roles considered equal. There is an acceptance of their position within which they
continue to exist; they challenge it in different ways, often continuing to maintain the myth of the
model of the respectable, accommodating woman.
The term auntie or aunty in itself can be considered an example of a botched aesthetic
because of its variety of meanings. In English, the term is used for someone who is a relative or
one of your parents’ siblings or cousins. In India, it is used for any older woman who is a
stranger or not a blood relative; this person can be your friend’s mother, for example. In this
relationship, there is a respectability and power dynamic because of the age and subsequent
hierarchical power it represents. Whether a relative or not, all women in society at a certain age
will be an aunty for someone. Considering the South Asian diaspora, aunties have a community
space that gives them a mode of survival in foreign lands. Aunties hold a unique space within the
histories of migration and dealing with marginalization. This space creates a dynamic notion of
kinship. Aunties' value and social power come from a mimetic performance rooted in iterative
cultural value systems that build in strength over time. The varying meanings and connotations
of the term give it fluidity and freedom; aunties can function outside the boundaries of hetero-

23

patriarchal family orders. For example, my mother’s sister, although she is fat, feels free to
comment intrusively on my body, ask me to lose weight, and criticize the tan I have from being
in the sun. However, she can still consider herself out of those standards because the beauty ideal
she holds me to is no longer accessible to her due to her age. The comments can stem from a
well-intentioned desire to hold me to a higher standard and an internalized view of my inability
to achieve the same. The comments can also be rooted in a hostile place of pure judgment, where
criticizing makes her feel better in relation to me.
The space of Critical Aunty Studies is essential for me to consider as it has the same
qualities of botched aesthetics that interest me in my work. The instinct to theorize critical aunty
studies, as with my adoption of botched aesthetics, stems from a desire to explore meaning-
making in a diasporic context in the West. Although the scope is not limited to a particular
region, it is important to consider its roots and scope. Critical Aunty Studies seeks to create room
for a feminist space of social relationship, that of the aunty, which is difficult to define or put
into a box. What defines it is common cultural experience and community. However, the need to
define it or theorize in the first place comes from a need for more knowledge and understanding
of such a relationship.

24

Conclusion
botched aesthetics, as a framework for art practice, intentionally botch or ruin binary
visual representations of identity, for example, the opposition of “colonized” / “colonizer.” In
this way, they create a fluid context of an ongoing dialogue between the origin culture and the
colonizer or diasporic culture instead. By providing a space for negotiation that judges but
simultaneously interrogates the flaws of that judgment, practitioners of botched aesthetics aspire
to be considerate and empathetic, acknowledging the limits and assumptions of transparency and
perfect knowledge. This means focusing on the audience and the context of art making, with all
the complexity of values and perspectives that entails.

25

Bibliography
Akinbola, Bimbola. “#Africanaunties: Performing Diasporic Digital Disbelongings on TikTok.”
Text and Performance Quarterly 42, no. 3 (2022): 284–97.
https://doi.org/10.1080/10462937.2022.2044071.
“Auntylectuals: A Nonce Taxonomy of Aunty-Power.” Text and Performance Quarterly 42, no.
3 (2022): 346–57. https://doi.org/10.1080/10462937.2022.2065023.
Boym, Svetlana. "Nostalgia and Its Discontents." Essays. http://www. uib. no/sites/w3. uib.
no/files/attachments/boym_nostalgia_and_its_discontents. pdf Retrieved 18 (2017).

Brahma Prakash, “Cultural Labour: Conceptualizing the ‘Folk Performance’ in India (Oxford
UP, 2019)
Butler, Brad, Karen Mirza, and Amrit Ganger. Cinema of Prayoga: Indian Experimental Film
and Video, 1913-2006. London: No.w.here, 2007.
Chatterjee, Partha. The Truths and Lies of Nationalism as Narrated by Charvak. Albany, New
York: State University of New York, 2022.
Dil Dhadakne Do. Film. India: Excel Entertainment, Junglee Pictures, 2015.
Garcia, Tristan, In Defense of Representation. In Christoph Cox, Jenny Jaskey & Suhail Malik
(eds.), Realism Materialism Art. Sternberg Press.(2015). pp. 245-251.
Johannesson Jessica Gaitán. “'What Have I Done?' and Other Illusions of Control .” Essay. In
The Nerves and Their Endings: Essays on Crisis and Response, 9. Brunswick, Victoria:
Scribe Publications, 2022.
Sambrani, Chaitanya. “Tushar Joag, Willing Suspension.”criticalcollective.in. Accessed
December 15, 2022. https://criticalcollective.in/ArtistInner2.aspx?Aid=133&Eid=62.
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. “Nationalism and the Imagination.” Critical studies (Amsterdam,
Netherlands) 37 (2014): 31–55.
This Our India. Inda: Films Division, 1960. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w_oS1fNhOcg.

Abstract (if available)

Abstract botched aesthetics is a term that Indian curator Yamini Telkar uses to evaluate the forms of cultural expression that have evolved as the result of a long and complex history of colonization. The idea of botched aesthetics suggests that India, as a nation, has internalized the framework and ideals of modernity that come from Euro-American culture but in a distorted or “botched” way. My work, and this thesis, explore not only the ideas of identity, nationalism, colonialism, and collective memory that underpin botched aesthetics but also the subversive potential they have in practice.

Linked assets

University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

Conceptually similar

PDF

The small things in between

PDF

Lost in translation: design in untranslatability

PDF

Orientalism and Chinoiserie: Chinese culture in the western fashion industry

PDF

Letters to my dead father: inter-generational trauma, ancestry.com and Disney's Encanto

PDF

Isn't Pickle so cute?

PDF

What’s the wig deal?: Exploring the use of wigs and head accessories in queer performance

PDF

After Babel: exploring the complexities of cross-cultural translation and appropriation

PDF

Through a violet lens: looking at holes, cuts and fragments in material, poetry, and performance

PDF

Journey to the end of the cul-de-sac: mythology and place in suburbia

PDF

Materials: an intersection of art and science

PDF

The aftermath of the Korean War: traumas and memories in the Korean post-war generation and visual art

PDF

Tattoo: a colonization story

PDF

Syncretic learning in augmented reality public monuments: a study of Judith F. Baca’s The river once ran

PDF

Alternative remembrance strategies: artists and archives

PDF

Performativity of sites of commemoration and performativity at sites of commemoration

PDF

Visualizing the effects of cultural communication on the individual: Confucianism and new family structure

PDF

Hip-pop Cí a design renaissance: the synergy of technology and creativity in digital and physical immersive media

PDF

Ghostly becoming

PDF

My body knows it all

PDF

Stolen culture: a discussion on decolonization and repatriation of Indigenous artifacts

Asset Metadata

Creator Aggarwal, Vrinda (author)

Core Title botched aesthetics: Indian identity and respresentation

School Roski School of Art and Design

Degree Master of Fine Arts

Degree Program Fine Arts

Degree Conferral Date 2023-05

Publication Date 04/12/2023

Defense Date 04/11/2023

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag aesthetics,Colonialism,identity,Memory,nationalism,OAI-PMH Harvest,representation

Format theses (aat)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Jones, Amelia (committee chair), Kelly, Mary (committee member), West, Jennifer (committee member)

Creator Email vrindaag@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC113013972

Unique identifier UC113013972

Identifier etd-AggarwalVr-11611.pdf (filename)

Legacy Identifier etd-AggarwalVr-11611

Document Type Thesis

Format theses (aat)

Rights Aggarwal, Vrinda

Internet Media Type application/pdf

Type texts

Source 20230413-usctheses-batch-1021 (batch), University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

Access Conditions The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the author, as the original true and official version of the work, but does not grant the reader permission to use the work if the desired use is covered by copyright. It is the author, as rights holder, who must provide use permission if such use is covered by copyright. The original signature page accompanying the original submission of the work to the USC Libraries is retained by the USC Libraries and a copy of it may be obtained by authorized requesters contacting the repository e-mail address given.

Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

Repository Location USC Digital Library, University of Southern California, University Park Campus MC 2810, 3434 South Grand Avenue, 2nd Floor, Los Angeles, California 90089-2810, USA

Repository Email cisadmin@lib.usc.edu