In the Nāṭya Śāstra (नाट्यशास्त्र, 'Naaht-yah-shaas-trah') - India’s foundational text on aesthetics - Bharata Muni first codified Rasa in Sanskrit: the "essence" or "flavor" of human experience.

Sanskrit Lens, a new digital artwork by Harshit Agrawal and Google Arts & Culture Lab, bridges this 2,000-year-old theory from the Nāṭya Śāstra.

Using Google's MediaPipe Pose, your movements interact with abstract artworks created by Harshit Agrawal with Google’s text-to-image model Imagen to visualize the "essence" of the nine emotions of Rasa.

In Harshit Agrawal’s words:
“Using Google technology to explore something as fundamental to Indian aesthetic theory as Rasas has been fascinating for me; it carries through an essential part of my practice exploring how technology enables not only a preservation of cultural material but an active engagement with it.”

Created by Harshit Agrawal with thanks to Google Arts & Culture Lab artists-in-residence Mélanie Fontaine and Simon Doury.