Recommended: Lord of the Dance
One of several episodes in Minneapolis Art Institute’s “The Object” podcast series. Hosted by Tim Gihring, the series explores the surprising, true stories behind museum objects, touching on immigration, race, and other issues. This episode is about the sculptural image of Shiva Nataraja--the Hindu god Shiva as the cosmic dancer, ensuring the cycle of life-- which in the 1920s, suddenly became a museum must-have. As India strove for independence, the image came to symbolize something of the nascent nation itself.