Toward blurring the boundaries in anthropology: Reading Jamini Roy today

Abstract

Disciplinary paradigms are often shaped and guided by powerfully established facts and understanding. The celebrated notion of objectivity leads us to follow this paradigmatic thought without questioning the processes of its foundation. This chapter is a reminder that art historians and anthropologists of art are parts of the very art worlds that they seek to study. It is through the contextualization of experiments and experiences of an Indian artist, namely Jamini Roy, this chapter has tried to present a local art world engulfed with the possibilities of having a more local vocabulary of art evolving through the collective myths of a region. Art need not be separated from culture. It should be studied through a holistic approach beyond the boundaries of dominance, hierarchy, and power.