performance
NOTE: The following excerpts are from the essay entitled "Hair Cuts" by Priya Nadkarni. They describe the intentions of Nadkarni's performance by the same title.
"…Claiming oneself as a feminist is still a dangerous thing… [When] a woman possesses [morality, intelligence, drive, force, rebellion, aggression and artistic expression] she is seen as [unmanageable] and a problem; and I hope that my work makes apparent the necessity of this "problem". Women are constantly dealing with cutting, breaking, splitting, spreading, opening; and as a female artist of color, these are especially significant actions.
…My work is about exploring femininity and identity through hair… I had been fascinated by the versatility of hair and its use as an indicator of race and gender. I had made work which includes pieces of my own hair for a few months until I started examining the significance of hair in my own life. This evolved into a piece called “I Used to Think That.” The piece is handmade paper with inclusions of my hair inside the paper. The phrase I used to think that Indian hair is ugly is printed over and over, like a verse, throughout the entire paper with the second half Indian hair is ugly alternating lines. The piece was the first time I had made myself absolutely vulnerable in my work. It confronted a time that I had not been willing to admit until that point. It was even difficult to explain to viewers that this was a true statement and something that I actually used to think of myself. And the fact that the phrase Indian hair is ugly could stand as a statement alone on the page was a revelation that a former thought is a [resonating] part of one’s present mentality and development. It also made apparent how important hypocrisy is in developing an identity. This is how I began exploring the idea of self-loathing as a path to self-worth. This work was an avenue for me to examine myself as ugly, undesirable and un-feminine.
… This was a defiant statement to reclaim the power to fabricate my own identity instead of falling victim to a projected one. If I could define my hair boldly on my own terms, then I wouldn’t have to passively use the language of others who cannot define my experience. The one adjective that held the most significance in defining my hair was the word “ugly.” It became very important to confront this word in terms of my identity. The reaction to this word was strong…
…It was also equally important for me to establish the cultural and racial identity of my hair. I define my hair as “Indian hair.” I want to address my experience, as a feminist of color, as a specific feminist experience. The way that I deal with my hair is strongly influenced by how I was raised culturally and the expectations of a young South Asian woman. Although my family has assimilated into Western culture quite fluidly, there still lurks [the] issues of proper body image for women including hair, height, body type and skin color. The statement of “Indian hair” is a direct reference to my cultural upbringing as well as my strong desire to be American, rather “un-Indian,” when I was younger. It is also important to note that my definition of Indian hair as black, thick, frizzy, ugly, unkempt and wild is really a definition of my own hair. This is an artistic claim that is strongly influenced by my former thinking as a young girl. It is a stereotype that I perpetuate in order to examine my own insecurities...
…It was both a challenge and a reaffirmation of my identity as “the exotic”… The work holds a great deal of importance to my existence as a woman and as an artist…The performance is not [just] an act that lasted twenty minutes; it is [but] a life-long performance that is enacted by every woman."