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This essay investigates the genre of the Indian blood painting, in which human blood is utilized as a medium of representation. It focuses, in particular, on the political and memorial functions of this kind of painting. Such paintings, often using the artist's own blood, frequently depict 'freedom fighters' (orshaheed) who perished in the Indian struggle for Independence, and are intended to reawaken memories among the public of forgotten martyrs. In so doing they form a moral commentary on a nation which, in its millennial rush to embrace the future, all too easily forgets the sacrifices that brought it into being. The political and memorial functions of this form of portraiture are contextualized within the country's wider sanguinary politics, which demonstrates the extent to which blood is both subject to and a means of contestation.

AbstractThis paper seeks to document and interpret some of the many life forms of the gift ofdanin contemporary India. It attempts to be both summative in reflecting on the recent extremely productive literature ondanand programmatic in identifying emergent themes and instances ofdanthat require more detailed analysis at present and in the future. The paper focuses in particular on highly public forms ofdan, and examines the relationship betweendanand modernist modes of philanthropy. It discusses the giving ofdanonline and biomedical variants ofdanwhich foreground sacrifice. The paper is not a final statement but a call to focus attention on new terrains ofdanand the continuing vitality of this distinctive set of exchange categories.