In late November, the Harvard community had the opportunity to virtually meet the Mittal Institute’s two newest Visiting Artist Fellows – Bunu Dhungana and Pragati Jain – through their Virtual Art Exhibition: Women in South Asia: Expectations, Burdens and Obligations. Both artists shared moving, personal reflections on their artwork (the full event video is above). The VAF Program, coordinated by faculty director Jinah Kim, George P. Bickford Professor of Indian and South Asian Art, Harvard University, and Sneha Shrestha, Arts Program Manager at LMSAI, allows for mid-career artists from South Asia to spend a semester at Harvard, where they engage with faculty and students and complete a research project.
The Mittal Institute recently interviewed Pragati Jain, a Bangalore, India-based artist (read Pragati’s interview here), and now checked in with Bunu Dhungana to learn more about her artistic motivations.
Mittal Institute: Thank you, Bunu, for participating in the Mittal Institute’s exhibition! Talk to us about your childhood – where did you grow up, and what drew you to the arts? How did your life experiences inform or influence your art today?
Bunu Dhungana: My parents tell me that I was quite a handful and a stubborn child, and that they didn’t know what to do with me. They sent me to a boarding school for a couple of years in Kathmandu; they had to keep moving around Nepal because of their jobs. It made practical sense, but it was also to discipline me. In retrospect, I feel that I suppressed a part of me in the process to fit in and be a “good girl,” though I always struggled to fit in. I think it’s been a process for me to find where I belong. As I grow older, I am getting more comfortable being myself and being the “bad woman.”
Bunu Dhungana.
It must have been difficult for my parents between their jobs, moving around, and handling my brother and me. I can now empathize with them; as you grow older, you realize how parents try their best, given their personal and structural constraints.
I always looked forward to the vacations. I got to see different parts of Nepal from early on – from villages to small towns to big cities. We would visit our grandparents from both sides in their respective villages during festivals too. I saw how inequalities were manifested in our immediate families because of a lack of access to resources and education. I didn’t have the vocabulary for it back then, but I understood. I saw how most of my family members had domestic help, and they were treated differently as well. Though over the years it has changed significantly, there is this strong sense of a feudal mindset. There are layers of caste, class, gender, and regional inequalities throughout Nepal. The idea of who gets to be a Nepali is such a fraught notion; it’s led by deeply brahminical patriarchal thinking.
Growing up in Nepal, I noticed how boys and girls were treated differently. I saw how women would be in the kitchen cooking while men would be talking about politics, and the women would serve them tea and food. It’s not that women didn’t discuss politics; rather, the gender roles were clearly defined.
There is one memory that I keep going back to: one of my favorite pastimes during my boarding school vacations was looking at my mother’s carefully-stored photo albums. Her family lived in a village in eastern Nepal, and they were well documented photographically. It was a big joint family. I even found a photo of her great-grandfather and great-grandmother. They had taken it in Darjeeling, India. Now that I look back, she had narrativized those albums. Photos of her almost entire clan — her mother, aunts, sisters-in-law, grandfather, father, uncles, brothers, sisters, cousins, nephews, and nieces along with her friends. Albums had group and individual portraits. She got it from her home when she got married. But what I can’t forget even now is seeing photos of my mother wearing miniskirts and trousers with her friends. I used to wonder why she never wore them anymore.
Over the years, some photo albums have faded while others have been misplaced or lost, but the memories of looking at the albums will always stay with me. So there was always a pull towards photography for me since the time I was a child. And even then, I hated when anyone told me that I had to behave like a girl! Naturally, all these experiences get translated into the work I do now.
Over the years, some photo albums have faded while others have been misplaced or lost, but the memories of looking at the albums will always stay with me. So there was always a pull towards photography for me since the time I was a child. And even then, I hated when anyone told me that I had to behave like a girl! Naturally, all these experiences get translated into the work I do now.
Mittal Institute: Why did you initially decide to apply to the VAF program? What do you hope to take home with you from this experience?
Bunu Dhungana: I learned about the VAF program in 2018, but I didn’t have the confidence to apply. I thought I would never get in. It’s Harvard! You know we have this image of institutions and an idea of people who belong here. And academically, I wasn’t a very bright student. Even now, I have my moments of doubt.
Then 2020 happened, and everything changed. Being by oneself during the lockdown was challenging and life-changing in so many ways. There were moments when I had such clarity about where I wanted to be in life, and there were times when I didn’t know what I was doing. In between these moments, I decided to apply. It worked on the application for months. I still have the draft. In the beginning, I was trying to sound smart, and it was so pretentious! One of my friends read my application and gave me her honest feedback, and that helped me so much. I feel truly grateful to be surrounded by people who give me honest feedback.
I applied, thinking I should at least give it a try. At the same time, I wanted to expand my understanding of art, dig deeper into feminist theories and interact with some of the best minds. I also wanted to see where my work would fit in the larger discourse of gender here.
When I tell people I am still processing my experience at Harvard, they make fun of me, but it’s true. It’s been a flow of information from the time I have come here, and it’s such a short amount of time. It’s unfair! And the amount of thinking we have to do in such a short span actually might not be a bad thing in the long run. One doesn’t always have the luxury of time, but it takes me time to formulate my thoughts and even more time to write them down.
I have noticed that people have such a strong sense of self here or maybe pretend to have such a sense? It could be a very superficial reading, but that’s the impression I get. So I hope to take that back with me, along with some experiences, friendships, and books. I dropped my wallet on the bus with money and all my credit cards in it, and someone returned it with everything intact. These experiences matter too. I am so grateful to the person who returned it. I now carry a fanny pack. Apparently, it’s hip!
From the series Confrontations @2018. By Bunu Dhungana.
Mittal Institute: What have been some highlights of your experience at Harvard thus far? And how are you finding it, being so far from home?
Bunu Dhungana: My highlights include going to classes. Oh, how I have missed going to classes! Even though I got to attend very few classes, I feel they were tremendously helpful. I got to share my work with students too. What stood out was seeing how students in the gender studies class reacted compared to the film students. In the former, the students shared their experiences of being women and man (there was only one in the class) and their thoughts on marriage and their relationships with their mothers, and the intersections of these experiences – it was so intimate.
In comparison, the film students wanted to know more about the process of making my work – the selection process of photographs in the series, framing, how people have viewed my work in different places, and when I think a body of work ends, among other questions. It’s maybe because they were working on their films too? It’s different when you have to make things; you think about the practicalities and the decisions one has to make during and after the creation.
I also want to add one more point here – there was one man in the gender studies class, and my friends from LLM were telling me about how out of around 100 men in their class, only one has opted for the Sex Equality class. This is something to think about – why are men resisting these classes? Is it because they believe these classes are only for women? Or do they not want to be a part of the conversation? I am really curious to find out more.
Being away from home and navigating this world has been an enriching experience, especially post-pandemic. I have enjoyed being out in the world and interacting with and connecting with people in a world that is so different from mine. There are some familiarities because of globalization, of course, but it is a different world. America is this giant cultural exporter, I guess. What happens here percolates down to our parts of the world culturally and politically.
Mittal Institute: As a VAF, you are currently working on a research project. Can you tell our community about your project, and how it is coming along? How can we view the finished product?
Bunu Dhungana: When I went to the Harvard Art Museum, I was starstruck looking at Rothko, Picasso, Pollock, among other “masters” of art, and wondered why I didn’t feel the same way looking at work by O’Keefe, for instance – so I started my research with that question. And this is not a new question, but it struck me while I was looking at artwork. During my research, I found out that Lina Nochlin, an American Art Historian, had asked in the seventies: Why haven’t there been great women artists?
While researching, I learned that women performance artists in the seventies used performance art as “feminist intervention” in opposition to traditional masculine art practices. I found this very powerful – and of course, this form isn’t without problems and questions like everything else, but it felt powerful.
I had been thinking of the word “performance” for a while. Many people, when they look at my work, talk about performance too. You know how we talk about gender as performative – performing for the camera, our everyday performances, performance arts, and a host of other intersections. So I am trying to understand the idea of performance in different disciples and mediums. It sounds very vast, but I am enjoying these complexities and connections. I can’t help but wonder, what is real in the end?
The beauty of academia is that people have worked on any idea that one can think of. That’s why I am so in awe of it – people have spent years researching, thinking, writing, and debating on different ideas. It’s beautiful. My only problem with academia is the writing. I wish it were more simplified.
I don’t know if you will get to see a finished product by the end of it, but this is making me think of various possibilities for sure.
Mittal Institute: As an artist, you must be completely dedicated to your craft. What do you hope your artwork inspires in people/society – what legacy to you hope to have?
Bunu Dhungana: This is the most difficult question for me to answer. I mean, legacy is such a big word, but at the same time, as I write this, I wonder why I am shying away from it. I hope to make work that will make people think and hopefully start conversations.
I do believe in the inherent power of art; it can provoke and ask questions, but one should be wary of glorifying it too much. It’s tied to so many other factors like power, gender, class, and economic structures. Of course, it has the power to transform and heal; at the same time, it’s important to critique it too. Also, who defines what art is? Who has the right to call oneself an artist? Who are we making art for? I think these are some questions to think about too as artists.
I do believe in the inherent power of art; it can provoke and ask questions, but one should be wary of glorifying it too much. It’s tied to so many other factors like power, gender, class, and economic structures. Of course, it has the power to transform and heal; at the same time, it’s important to critique it too. Also, who defines what art is? Who has the right to call oneself an artist? Who are we making art for? I think these are some questions to think about too as artists.
Mittal Institute: What are the biggest challenges and opportunities of a career in the arts? What advice would you give someone contemplating a career path like yours?
Bunu Dhungana: I think everyone’s journey is different as an artist. It matters where you are situated in the world. Sometimes it is easy to give advice to people about what they should do without understanding the context of where they are coming from. But one advice I would like give is to find a mentor who can give you honest feedback. That’s important.
I would personally love to see more Nepali names and more Nepali women artists globally. Why are there so few names? We need to think about this.
You know I never thought I would be an artist. Growing up in a middle-class household in a country like Nepal means you study and get a job. I didn’t know or see any artists in my immediate surroundings growing up. And I have clear memories of my father saying how he always wanted to become a writer but he had a family to take care of.
After my Master’s degree, I worked as a researcher for some years, which took me around Nepal, and that was when I got a point-and-shoot camera and started taking photos. I wanted to pursue academics but failed miserably. Somehow I jumped into photography without thinking too much. I was so confident that I had a knack for visuals! I didn’t understand back then that it would take me many years to hone my skills as a photographer and a storyteller.
Most importantly, I didn’t understand how difficult it would be to sustain things financially. Now I see I also had a certain kind of privilege to make these decisions, but it wasn’t easy. And I still have a long way to go. I have so much to learn and unlearn.
I am definitely in a better position now than, say, five years ago, but I still struggle to make the best use of the opportunities that come my way; a part of me is still unsure about myself. I hope this self-doubt goes away.
Bunu Dhugana’s Virtual Exhibit
From the series Confrontations @2017
Medium: Digital photography
Archival Pigment prin
