The archetype of the motherland in contemporary Indian art

Abstract

This article analyses the depictions of the female archetype, particularly the motherland, in contemporary Indian art. The motherland is a universal archetypal symbol for almost any Indo-European culture, its visualisation in Indian culture coincides with the formation of the art of the Bengali school of painting. The first documented instance of the motherland motif in India occurred in the late 19th century, as exemplified by Abanindranath Tagore's 1905 work, “Soul of the Motherland”. In contemporary India, the image of the motherland, also known as Bharat Mata, the mother of India, remains a prominent subject in the realm of contemporary Indian art, frequently explored by prominent artists. Concurrently, the artists examined in this article (including key avant-garde artists such as Amrita Sher-Gil and Maqbool Fida Husain, and the pioneers of feminist art in India — Nalini Malani, Pushpamala N.) each modify the image by addressing very different aspects of the maternal archetype. The present article not only highlights the history and cultural context of the development of the image, but also endeavours to examine the work of the artists from the perspective of their interaction with existing and new mythologies and archetypes. The analysis of works of art in this case implies the author's appeal to various methods, not only cultural and sociological, but above all to the psychoanalytical method developed by Carl Gustav Jung and his follower Erich Neumann. The objective of this article is to describe and analyse the aspects of the female archetype that have been the focus of attention by prominent Indian artists working with this theme. Furthermore, it will demonstrate how the archetype of the motherland has been modified throughout the 20th and 21st centuries in Indian visual arts. The study concludes that avant-garde artists addressed aspects of the female archetype that had already been partially established in traditional art, but expressed them in a novel form and context. The female archetype encompassed a new experience, and therefore manifested itself in a metamorphosed form.