Kendriya Vidyalaya Workshop for Teachers

Speaker:

Dr. Anagha Bhat

Abstract:

Archaeology is a discipline that studies culture through its material manifestations. It provides tools to understand the past through various objects left behind by ancient people. Although these objects are often broadly termed 'art' by modern people because of their decorative motifs, their original purpose was much more varied. They could have been used in multiple ways such as ornaments or toys, as modes of transaction or for rituals and so on. These objects tell us about the thought processes that went into creating them and also how the creators interacted with each other and their environment. For example, what we consider as rock 'art' today, tells us much more than the artistic skills utilized to make the art. It tells us about the surrounding environment, tools they used, trees, animals, the gods they worshipped and their emotions towards them.

Earlier art forms, tribal art and modern art are nothing but links in the same chain and these paintings talk to us in the language which is beyond words, and is universal. As an alternative to traditional textual, linear learning, this talk will focus on a range of visual, verbal and performative methods of sensory engagement and knowledge generation. It will talk about earlier/earliest art forms as a tool to show the participants how people in the past began conveying their thoughts through drawings when verbal language was probably existent in its earliest form as well or not present at all.

About the speaker:

Dr. Anagha Bhat is an artist and socio-archaeologist, and studies the ever-growing mosaic of cultures by involving communities in creating contemporary designs. She completed her under graduate degree in sculpture (Sir. J.J. School of Art, Mumbai), post-graduation and Ph.D. in Ancient Indian History, Culture and Archaeology (Deccan College, Post Graduate and research Institute, Pune). She has spent over 12 years in the field of art, archaeology and education. Her core area of research and work is to understand people's perceptions about the past and the sense of identity they construct accordingly. Anagha's work revolves around engaging archaeology, ethnographic research, and history in creating site-specific community art which can function as sustainable and relevant learning tools for the public. In other words, archaeology helps her to understand and contextualize people's perceptions through cognitive research; whereas the artist in her helps her to come up with creative ideas to channelize them in a sustainable way. She has conducted around 80 workshops on various themes based on art and archaeology for school and college students. She also conducts seminars for school teachers. She has delivered talks on Public Archaeology at reputable Institutes in the country. She works as a consultant for various cultural centres in designing interdisciplinary courses, and cultural programmes.