A hegemonic (cultural) regime of representation refers to the symbolic and political power to represent ‘the Other’ in ways which control the mode in which ‘the Other’s’ image and identity is perceived and apprehended. This paper scrutinizes Romani’s resistance through artistic practice to the hegemonic regimes of representation imposed on them in popular culture, political discourse and mass media. Thus, the common, stereotypical representations of Roma by the majority’s culture (e.g. the British documentary series “Big Fat Gypsy Wedding”) are part of a culture of domination where the Romani people are envisioned as “exotic”, “lazy” “unreliable”, “treacherous” and “promiscuous.”
On the one hand, this paper argues that the new, artistic-political vigor revealed through the works of the artists of Roma descent fights back the essentialized and fixed understandings of Romani identity and culture. On the other hand, not all the artists of Roma origin produce this type of critical-political art. Although all pieces of art examined in this paper are produced to counteract past and present violence against the Romanies (“Gypsy-phobia”) in Europe and beyond, some pieces fail to overcome the regimes of self-essentialization, self-ethnicization and auto-exoticization. While some artists reinforce century old stereotypes about “Roma’s peculiar aesthetics and culture,” other artists refuse to stage their ethnicity - by participating and producing art for national and international “Roma exhibitions,” “human rights festivals” or for Roma thematically focused cultural events - on the grounds that they refuse to be part of what they call “Roma cultural industry.” Re-staging “ethnic art” and essentializing ethnic and cultural difference is for some artists of Roma ancestry an entry ticket to the mainstream art world and its institutions. Others refuse the commodification of ethnic and cultural difference. The paper attempts, to disentangle how “Contemporary Roma Art” is now in an ambivalent position between complicity and resistance to hegemony within the horizon of hope.
