The Great Ganesha

One surefire method of amusing yourself is taking a look at the kinds of searches that lead people to your blog. Amongst others, today I saw one that read “ganesha and madonna.” Curiosity took over, and I googled the phrase, frantically thinking that at some point in my foolish youth, I may have had something with Madonna during one of my blackout phases. Alas, no such luck. Not even the blog showed up.

But don’t fret, this post is not a total waste, because I did chance upon something interesting. It was an old 2003 article by Subhamoy Das on the Hinduism page at about.com. In particular, this article was titled ‘Hollywood Hinduism: Art vs. Morality’. And it was about all of the various ways in which Hinduism has been portrayed in pop culture by artists, actors and Hollywood.

For instance, did you know that Mike Myers once posed as a “cartoonish Hindu deity” (the image on the left) in the April 1999 issue of Vanity Fair? I’m not the first to talk about that one. SAJA has done its fair share of hashing and rehashing the issue through articles and online forums here.

Also, Aerosmith, the famed pop-rock (in my opinion) band, had a CD-issue with an image of Krishna on the cover, except that he had a cats face and breasts. After thousands of protests, Sony withdrew the CD.

And, last but not least, Madonna apparently came dressed as Shiva at the 1998 MTV Music Awards after which, India suddenly was hot amongst the fashionistas.

Ok, all of that is well and good, but what Mr. Das says right towards the end is what sparked my interest. He says,

…the entire concept of judging works of art is quite relative. It greatly depends on an individual’s aesthetic tastes, preferences, temperament and forbearance. Many people are of the opinion that art is a free creation of an artist, who has complete license to give art whatever form or sound s/he chooses. But is it morally right to reap creative benefits at the cost of maligning the cultural and religious sentiments of another sect? Therefore, it remains an open debate whether such depictions are OK by any standard. [link]

I agree. I’m still not sure whether I should be offended by these things. Firstly, it might be considered hypocritical since I myself, have taken on the pseudonym of a god. Secondly, having dabbled a little bit in the arts myself (printmaking, photography), I can see how one might feel compelled to use snippets of art from other cultures in their works. But, at the same time, Mike Myers’ photoshoot in Vanity Fair can only very, very loosely be called “art.” And, as for Aerosmith’s album cover, that was just designed to sell albums. Then again, one can argue that art is solely designed to sell itself. So that brings us back to square one.

Many people better than me have argued for as well as against this. And there’s still no consensus. So I guess the debate continues…

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