Cosmopolitan Vision: The Photography of Deen Dayal, (1844-1905)

Dr Dewan and Dr Hutton will be presenting a paper on the works of one of the pioneers of Indian photography, Lala Raja Deen Dayal. The paper is entitled �Cosmopolitan Vision: The Photography of Deen Dayal (1844-1905)�. Deen Dayal was, and still is, regarded as India’s foremost 19th century photographer. Colonial writers labeled him the premier ‘native’ photographer and in the decades after independence, he has emerged as national figure of sorts, and even, according to some scholars, as a site of subaltern agency. His photographs record the complex interactions between Indian Princely states and British imperialists in the subcontinent. In particular, his position as court photographer to the Sixth Nizam of Hyderabad allowed him to develop a unique perspective into aristocratic life in the Deccan peninsula.

Yet much about Deen Dayal’s life remains unstudied. In this talk Dr Hutton and Dr Dewan present the results of their decade long research into Deen Dayal’s work. They intend to argue that far from being a one-dimensional photographer of the elite, Deen Dayal, through his art, managed to straddle the commercial world of Bombay, the princely realm of Hyderabad and colonial centers across north and east India with remarkable proficiency. His work thus offers modern viewers a glimpse into an era marked by colonialism, fledgling nationalism, and the onset of a unique modernity�one that simultaneously responded to local and international concerns, that made use of and broke with the past.

This talk employs strategies developed in art history, photo studies and postcolonial studies, and is based on a forthcoming publication of Dr Hutton and Dr Dewan which uses Deen Dayal as an entry point for a more complex understanding of Indian photography.

Dr Deborah Hutton has been assistant professor of Asian and Islamic Art History at the College of New Jersey since 2004. Dr Hutton is an acknowledged expert on Indo-Islamic art, with a focus on 16th-19th century works from across South Asia. In particular, her research engages with the complex subject of the role art played in forming identities and facilitating intercultural exchange in what is now the Deccan region of India. Dr Hutton received her PhD from the University of Minnesota and had taught at both the University of Pittsburgh as well as Skidmore College before joining the College of New Jersey. She has been published regularly in journals such as Archives of Asian Art and History of Photography. Her book manuscript, The Art of the Court of Bijapur (Indiana University Press, 2006) won the American Institute of Indian Studies Edward Cameron Dimock Jr. Prize in the Indian Humanities. She is also the co-editor of Asian Art: An Anthology (Blackwell, 2006) and A Companion to Asian Art (Blackwell, forthcoming). Dr Hutton has been the recipient of fellowships from the National Endowment of the Humanities, the American Institute of Indian Studies and the College Art Association.

Dr Deepali Dewan is presently serving as the Curator of South Asian arts and culture at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM). She also teaches in the Department of Art at the University of Toronto and is affiliated with the Centre of South Asian Studies. Dr Dewan earned her PhD in art history from the University of Minnesota in 2001. She joined the ROM in 2002 as an associate curator for South Asian civilizations, prior to which she had experience working with the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and Asia Society in New York. Her primary research focus is on 19th and 20th century visual cultures in South Asia with a view to understanding the influence of art on the formation of post-colonial identities in the region. Some of her recent publications include �A Lover’s Discourse: The Art of Anita Dube� in Young Indians, edited by Gayatri Sinha (New Delhi, Bodhi Publications, forthcoming.) and �Aesthetic Dichotomies and Conceptual Terrains in Sylvat Aziz’s Mother of all Postcards� in Nukta (vol.2 no.1 pp.99-104). Dr Dewan has been the recipient of fellowships from the Social Science Research Council, the American Institute of Indian Studies, the College Art Association and the MacArthur Program/Interdisciplinary Center for the Study of Global Change.