Big cities, small treasures

THIS piece is as much about art and archaeology, as it is about politics.

The above title belongs to a small but carefully-mounted exhibition on the “Ancient world of the Indus Valley”which was on view till a few weeks back in the Californian city of Pasadena. One does not think of this laidback if elegant nook of the USA as being naturally possessed of deep interest in the arts of the Indian subcontinent, but most museums in that country see themselves — unlike here — as playing a distinct role in the life of the society, enriching and informing it at the same time. In this instance, it was the Pacific Asia Museum of Pasadena, built around an early core of artefacts from other cultures brought into the USA at an early date by missionary groups, which had taken the initiative. The Indus Valley exhibition was first seen in New York, and now here it was, on the west coast: exciting minds, bringing fresh information.

There was much interest in the show, for it did after all present one of the oldest cultures known to the world, with all its puzzles and its still unlocked mysteries. Through a range of artefacts and photographs and maps, it set out to present aspects of the culture: its origins, the life in its great cities, the trade and commerce it carried out with other parts of the ancient world, the beliefs and rituals of its people.

There were familiar sights in the show: those wonderful seals and sealings with their still undeciphered script; small statues made of metal and steatite, including that of a priestly figure that every schoolboy sees in his textbook; clay figurines of the mother goddess; lively renderings of animals on a tiny scale; exquisitely crafted jeweller; earthen pots of elegant shapes and elaborate patterning; agate and carnelian beads.

But there also were some unfamiliar ones, like the figure of a man with one arm raised, interpreted as being in the act of throwing a spear, or the bronze figurine of a standing bejewelled woman, possessed of something of the elegance of a Giacometti sculpture; or again, some of the seals with composite animals and the same tantalising scripts, not seen before. All of it made for an attractive show, neatly packaged and displayed, something that needed to be looked at with care.

The texts in the catalogue or the brochures read well. There was clarity in them, and much seemingly precise information. Predictably, there was emphasis on the sites of Mohenjodaro and Harappa, or the currently worked ones like Nausharo in Baluchistan; fresh theories concerning the relationship of the Indus Valley people with the Aryans were taken up for discussion; there was speculation about the slow manner in which the culture declined as against the earlier held belief about its coming to an apocalyptic end.

But — this is where politics comes in — in all this, one could notice the studied reluctance to include any references to India or to Hinduism. True, the maps provided did bring in such important sites as Lohtal and Dholavira, or Ropar. But everything that had anything to do with India, with Indian religions, or with Indian scholarship, seemed to be glossed over, played down. It was essentially Pakistan, its ‘ancient history’ and its ‘unbroken culture’ which appeared to be the chief themes of the show.

The exhibition was clearly yet another link in the chain in which shows bearing titles like “Five Thousand Years of Pakistan” have been put together and presented in the West with some consistency in the past few years. The fact that Pakistan is only a little more than 50 years old is of course of no concern either to those who mount and name these shows, or to most people who come to see them. Suddenly, Pakistan has become an ‘ancient nation,’ with a ‘continuous and independent history’ spanning five millennia.

I was particularly stuck by the omission of all references to the possibility of a connection between the faith of the Indus people — or the symbols so prominently used by them — and what was later referred to as Hinduism. It was as if all those objects — figures seated in yogic stances, renderings of tree-spirits worshipped as goddesses, signs such as the swastika — had never even existed.

Some friends with whom I had gone to see the show spoke of how the archaeologist-bureaucrat who had accompanied the show from Pakistan, was heard as dismissing all questions on the subject with a flourish. If he had had his way, they told me, the roots of Islam might well have been traced by him among the ruins of the great cities of the Indus. Thus proceeds the study of history and of art, among some people.

A determined effort

There was a possibility, I was told while there, of this exhibition being shown at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. Considering the scale and the importance of that museum, this would have been a logical thing, had it happened. But, as is common, the exhibition needed some outside funding. The South Asian community, with a large Indian component, was repeatedly approached but was never able to make its mind up. The Pakistan group based in Pasadena, on the other hand, acted with remarkable alacrity, put funds together, and was ready to be involved in organising a number of satellite events to go with the show. Their agenda was clearly the same as that taken up in the exhibition. And does one blame them?

(This article was published on 07 May 1999)