Can Developing Women Create Primitive Art? and Other Questions of Value, Meaning and Identity in the Circulation of Janakpur Art

In this article, I examine the values and meanings that adhere to objects made by Maithil women at a development project in Janakpur, Nepal – objects collectors have called ‘Janakpur Art’. I seek to explain how and why changes in pictorial content in Janakpur Art – shifts that took place over a period of five or six years in the 1990s – occurred, and what such a change might indicate about the link between Maithil women’s lives, development, and tourism. As I will demonstrate, part of the appeal for consumers of Janakpur Art has been that it is produced at a ‘women’s development project’ seeking to empower its participants. And yet, the project’s very successes threaten to displace the producers (and what they produce) from their perceived qualities/identities as ‘traditional’ and ‘primitive,’ thereby bringing into question the authenticity of the ‘art’ they produce. The conundrum begs this question: can developing women produce primitive art?

Mérode Altarpiece, center panel, Annunciation: objects on table

Robert Campin, workshop of; oil on oak

Description des objects d'arts qui composent le cabinet de le Baron V. Denon. Estampes et ouvrages a figures par Duchesne Ainé.

Mode of access: Internet.

[Kraus collection of art auction catalogs.

Miscellaneous catalogs of exhibitions held mostly in Paris and issued by various publishers, from the H. P. Kraus collection.

Le système de classification adopté par la Commission Impériale : précéde d'une nomenclature alphabéthique des produits de l'agriculture, de l'industrie et de l'art, indiquant, pour chacun, la classe et la section auxquelles il se rapport, a l'usage des exposants, des comités et des jurys.

Mode of access: Internet.

Illustrated supplement to the descriptive catalogue published by Edmond Johnson ... of fac-simile reproductions of Irish antique art metal work : specially manufactured for exhibition at the World's Fair, Chicago, 1893; the International Exposition, Paris, 1900; and the International Exhibition, Glasgow, 1901; and as supplied to the principal museums of America, Great Britain, and the Continent /

Acquisition made accessible thanks to the generous support of the Frederick J. and Margret L. Worden Endowment.

A list of the works contributed to public exhibitions by J.M.W. Turner, R.A. /

Mode of access: Internet.

Annual of the Chicago Architectural Club, being the book of the ... annual exhibition ... Art Institute, Chicago.

Mode of access: Internet.

Exhibition of the Kevorkian collection : including objects excavated under his supervision : exhibited at the galleries of Charles of London ... New York, March-April, 1914.

Cover title: Exhibition of Muhammedan-Persian art.