The Work of Pat in the Era of Electronic Transmission

Dream Kitsch — Folk Art, Indigenous Media and `9/11'

The Work of Pat in the Era of Electronic Transmission

1. Bhaskar Mukhopadhyay
   1. Goldsmiths College, UK, b.mukhopadhyay@gold.ac.uk, bhasakarccs@gmail.com

Source

 doi: 10.1177/1359183507086218 Journal of Material Culture March 2008 vol. 13 no. 1 5-34

Abstract

This article explores the process of transmission of the image(s) of 9/11 through an ethnographic/art-historical examination of Bengali (Indian) pat (traditional scroll painting) made by a community of rural Indian artisans with little or no exposure to mass-media. It transpires that while the impact of mass-media — often held responsible for the extinction of `authentic' folk art — has been somewhat exaggerated, the argument put forward here is that the putative anteriority of a time before representation, is largely an illusion.

• 9/11
• folk art
• kitsch
• local/global
• mass-media
• representation