In Chapter 8, “Performance of Archaeological Representations,” I argue that the ritual of the state and its fetish for superficial perfection subsumes daily practices of archaeology. ASI archaeologists engaged in the performative practice of presenting and (re)presenting the evidence they unearthed. At a minute level, this comprised of rituals of photography and drawing at the site—of the artifacts, trenches, stratigraphy, and the excavation site. At a spectacular scale, this consisted of site visits by visiting dignitaries and officials, from the local district magistrate to the chief minister of the state. These diverse performative strategies were simultaneously aimed at the epistemic articulation of the archaeological site as an ideological location of state performance and the representation of excavated material culture as scientific evidence. The excavated site was transformed into an arena of spectatorial performance where the precision of scientific archaeology along with the statist power was exalted in uncovering the ancient civilization that made up the nation. This spectatorial ritual was an essential post-excavation process of the ASI archaeological intervention and it deployed the performative aspect of the excavation site to further the ideological and epistemological goal of the statist organization.