Tanya Talwar

The PhD project, ‘Art Education between Heritage-Making and Critical Transregionality’ examines the transformations in the pedagogy and praxis of art in relation to the schools of art established in India under British rule. The introduction of ‘art’ education saw the establishment of four schools of industrial/applied arts. Chiefly in the major centres of Madras (Government School of Industrial Arts, 1852), Calcutta (School of Industrial Art, 1854), Bombay (Elphinstone Institute, 1854) and Lahore (Mayo School of Arts, 1875). After manifold transformations, they are now known as the Government College of Fine Arts, Chennai, Government College of Art & Craft, Kolkata, The Sir J. J. School of Art, Mumbai and the National College of Arts, Lahore. A uniform syllabus was designed for colonial academic instruction, leaving room for creative self-explorations for artists and art enthusiasts. Using archival records from South Asia and parts of Europe (Kolkata-Lahore-Berlin-London), the debates on the entanglements of modernity, artistic identity, form and expression are explored. Works of artists, art administrators, students, public intellectuals, and critics are analysed to draw a fuller picture. Research on art education in relation to different, albeit connected, institutions of art in South Asia and beyond can expose networks wherein art, aesthetics, politics, and questions of heritage are constantly reevaluated.

PhD Supervisors
Prof. Dr. Eva Ehninger, Professorin für Kunstgeschichte der Moderne, Institut für Kunst- und Bildgeschichte (IKB), Humboldt Universität zu Berlin
Prof. Dr. Monica Juneja, Professor of Global Art History at the Heidelberg Centre for Transcultural Studies, Universität Heidelberg