Gandhi- Beyond Borders

My recent blog post on Artist K M Madhusudhanan’s (one of the eminent members of The Radical Movement, an avant-garde movement of the 80s) first Solo exhibition “Gandhi – Beyond Borders” happening at 1X1Gallery, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai was published in Nalini Malaviya's blog, Art Scene India. The exhibition is closing on 31 Dec 2019. It unmistakably explores the traces of melancholy, a sense of foreboding and inherent-volcanic-violence in today’s times. In case you are in Dubai and you haven't checked it out yet, do hurry.

It's been a great honour and pleasure to talk to this eminent artist about this particular exhibition and his earlier art phase as well. Thanks to Madhusudhanan Sir for his time.

You can follow this LINK to read about this exhibition.

Where Art Happens - Thought is also a Matter - Kochi Muziris Biennale 2018

I chanced upon Vaishali Oak and Raju Sutar at one of the exhibition Openings in Gallery 27, Mattancherry two years ago. Vaishali and I connected instantly, and from then on we have met on and off at a couple of exhibitions. Raju had curated a show “Roots/Routes” during Kochi Muziris Biennale 2016. It was one of the best shows and it was part of the Collateral project as well. This year Raju Sutar is back again in Jew Town with “Thought is also a Matter” as part of the Collateral project organized by artexperiments.com. The artists include Vaishali Oak, Sandip Sonawane, Rajesh Kulkarni, Hrishikesh Pawar and Raju Sutar himself.

“How does it (thought) work on our minds and on different levels, conceptual or otherwise; or does the thought go beyond? I think it is important to question/challenge the very idea and go deeper instead of adopting it as it comes to you.” – Raju Sutar (from the Concept Note)

Enormous canvas paintings, huge fabric assemblages, colourful canvas on wooden mounts in basic shapes, languidly floating terracotta ‘matters’ in steel wires and culturally-transmuted performative pieces are not what you expect when you hear the title “Thought is also a matter.” Time and thought go hand in hand. Not a moment passes without a thought as we, humans, as are so cluttered with thoughts. While the sages had enlightened thoughts, we normal mortals have chaotic ones. It’s an exploration into this day-to-day seemingly mundane and unconscious process which is made exciting, colourful, humungous, surreal, performative and gestural in “Thought is also a matter.” Each artist reflects on the effect of thought in their lives and brings out their exclusive perspective.

Vaishali Oak and Raju Sutar

Entire Existence is a Thought Except Now – Raju Sutar

Raju Sutar explores the concept of ‘NOW’ and what this ‘now’ can offer. It’s an interlude between past and future. What is now will become past in a moment and it shapes the future as well. So 'Now' is crucial. He has made seven enormous 12’x42’ canvas with ‘action paintings’ as Raju calls it as his focus was just on actions of the now and not on the movement. The movement would have needed more organized thought and he was just living the now, capturing the fleeting thought by thought. There is also an animation that captures the movement of his action paintings like scribbles that web out of a plain surface projected onto the wall.

“...by avoiding movement of thought I am trying to look at the possibility of mutation to happen in the moment of ‘now’. Is there a possibility of mutation to happen in NOW? Which may change the course of the future. Yes, that is the quest going on...” ~ Raju Sutar

Seed Post – Vaishali Oak

An age-old thought revisited. A seed has always been associated with life and propagation of life and ideas. To Vaishali thought is a seed that when sown at the appropriate time sprouts into a sapling, which when nourished and nurtured would grow into healthy 'beings' providing food, shade and shelter. All life processes begin from that seed and ends in the seed. Follow its journey and you can journey along into the depths of your being. Vaishali’s fabric assemblages are intensely colourful drawing our eye and prompting it to move from one end to the other and back again. You could see the layered fabrics, the tear, the threads, the peeping warp, the in-between muted tones and you see the evolution of her thought. She has a black seed installation hanging from the roof ready to burst to life. Vaishali has even devised a Seed Postcard embedded with seeds that are available at the counter which can then be sent to your loved ones who can sow these cards and there you go with a ‘life’ sprouting from within.

“There is a great significance in the evolution of civilization. We are the products of what has been sown yesterday and this process will go on. When we dream of a brighter future we have to sow seeds ‘now’. ...Just as the way seeds travel and propagate, our thoughts do travel and propagate in our minds.” ~ Vaishali Oak

Breaking it Down to the Basics – Sandip Sonawane

According to Sandip Sonawane, we break down a complex image into simple shapes in the initial process of drawing for a better rendition of the image, for a proper grasp of the proportion and details. Whether it’s a circle, a triangle, a square etc. they are but the joining of lines to form an object/shape. So any complex picture can be broken down into basic shapes and can be seen en-route formation. They are also the boundaries that project an exterior and an interior; the field within and without. At first glance from a distance one could see monotones of shapes – circles, squares and triangles – in red, yellow, black etc. but as you near you could easily discern the layers of paint beneath; a camouflage of thoughts in 6’x6’.

“The idea is to break down the thoughts in a similar way. The thoughts are complex in nature we try to break them down to make sense. Whether it makes sense or not.” ~Sandip Sonawane

A Thought about a ‘Thought’ – Rajesh Kulkarni

Rajesh Kulkarni’s take on ‘thought’ is much more dreamlike and esoteric. Thoughts are like particles that hang around and once it steps into the past it immediately transforms that energy into enigmatic, abstract and clustered forms. Rajesh’s “Thought” is 15’x45’x28’ where beautifully sculpted terracotta forms float indolently in space through thin steel wires at the slightest breeze. One can even walk around it absorbing the sight of those gleaming earthy forms as the sun hits the roof, seeps through the pores of the warehouse and falls on its ‘raw skin’.

“When I thought about a ‘thought’ I thought that the thought that travels with speed, that has fickleness of present and at the same time, there is a sense of strong flowing reality. Present that annihilates the moment it creates itself. There is a grasp of multi-faceted analysis of the moment and amalgamation of mixed illusions co-existing.” ~ Rajesh Kulkarni

ITIAN – I/Travel/I/Arrive/Not – Hrishikesh Pawar

Hrishikesh Pawar's pertinent question here is where do thoughts originate and where does it end? It plays with time and space; a space with characters performing postures and gestures that have been imbibed, altered and metamorphosed not from any single individual or the performers themselves but from a “library of personalities” or “a pile of flesh, living a metaphor of turmoil and conflict of the surroundings affecting the present “Thought.” “ This performance is the melting pot; a layered deconstruction of various traditional dance/performative forms from Maharashtra and Kerala. With the help of 4 assistant choreographers, 25 dancers, they are to perform 48 shows by the end of the Biennale. The performance dates can be sought after at the exhibition venue. I am yet to see the performance albeit I did see their video in the gallery.

“A weaving of story-telling between the performer and the audience with abstract rhythmic poetry of sounds, gestures and forms. The performance is a first draft of re-imagining the physical aesthetic of the body and its thought which creates matter.” ~ Hrishikesh Pawar

photo courtesy -KMB

“Thought is also a Matter” is on view at VII/35, Jew Town Road, Kappalandimukku until Mar 29, 2019.

Where Art Happens - Enunciation of an Enigma - Juul Kraijer - Kochi Muziris Biennale 2018

One of the artists’ whose works I could relate to most at many levels is perhaps Juul Kraijer, the dynamic Dutch artist. Her works are mystical and quite uncanny and it’s hard to explain its effect on us; they have this haunting mystery about it. Juul Kraijer started with drawings, progressed into sculptures and extended into photography and even short films. The instant I stepped in and laid my eyes on her works I felt connected. They are pretty intense and amazing as they reflect the emotional perceptions of self (whoever is looking at it and most pertaining to women, I feel). I probably felt this deep connection more so because I myself am often exploring the inner realms and the emotional-spiritual space than the external one. That doesn’t mean I am doing the same kind of work but it is women’s psyche that I am pretty interested in. That said the inner self is not exempt from the outer one and is always a twisted-reflection of the exterior (not generalising, this is often subjective). It is those very actions that take it to the inner-most suggestions and experiences all through our explorations.

Juul Kraijer

“The eloquence of my drawings I can't match with words. In spite of this, I'm asked so regularly and with such persistence to give a specific explanation, that I don't want to refuse out rightly doing so...Personally, I shrink back from interpreting my work, considering the fact that the meaning of a drawing is always ambiguous. If it were unambiguous, I would have chosen a more direct form than the poetic-associative one of visual art.” ~ Juul Kraijer

Photo-Archival pigment print on Hahnemuehle Museum Etching -38.6x50.7cm-2014-15

The awkward-contorted poses, the bleak-eerie look, the suggestions of duality, the connection of man and nature at the very core, the unusual juxtaposition of animals and self probably mentioning the basic animal instinct that man is supposed to possess, minimal and yet a taste of the elaborate is all served in one plate. Even when we try to understand others, we often fail to understand self. But then these days trying to understand others is not much in vogue; we often close doors at the slightest of misgivings. Only when we realize who we truly are will others stand a chance, I suppose. As it’s said: “How can you love others when you don’t love yourself?” It stands true for any other sentiment too.

“I seem to be the type of artist who recognizes a small field as his or her domain, to be explored in depth and detail. In the drawings made during those twelve years, the main principles remain the same. Changes do not occur in the form of an abrupt break; instead, they appear as gradual shifts, leaving the core intact, like landscapes at the turn of the season.” ~ Juul Kraijer

Charcoal on paper/pastel on paper - 2013/2014

Juul’s drawings are in charcoal – sometimes with wiping and rubbing that traces the earlier patterns, her earlier drawings are less linear and her isolated forms loom out of emptiness or the black undefined background. Time, space and context remain absent in this landscape of the mind that just stretches far and wide, there is conciseness, lightness and brevity, female body borders on androgynous without explicit details like eyebrows, breasts and pubic hair, expressions are unmoved and reticent; a posture adopted for eternity, her forms are completely self-absorbed as if in a profound sleep or death, bodies are neutral and they mark the domain of the spirit rather than some reality and all that is there is ambiguous. Impermanence is the perpetual cohort or rather a confidante in Juul’s works. Some works also feature swarms and flocks that contours the human forms, and some have the twin form – the play of duality. Japanese, Indian and classical influences and that of Balthus as she herself mentions can be traced in her works.

“I frequently have the feeling that I am no more than a conduit.” ~ Juul Kraijer

Photograph-Archival pigment print on Hahnemuehle Museum Etching-2014-15 edition

The eeriest, however, is her works with creatures. The medusa-like figures, the bugs, scorpion, snakes, owl and chameleon crawling, slithering or standing over, the face with tiny faces on it. The woman with her half-snake hidden face teases our senses. It could be facing our inner fears while baring ourselves to the world for them to see and yet stay aloof, impenetrable. There is a kind of violation in her images that is always endured and accepted. It most certainly raises the question of “Why such disconcerting endurance?” The inner turmoil while maintaining an external inertness is all too evident. The presence of these sinuous creatures seems to accessorise and become an inseparable and inevitable part of the form also indicating the beast within us. Juul’s figures evade gaze as they are in their own realm, pre-occupied, in monotone surroundings mostly black and luminous white. Her mutating figures may speak a thousand tongues and yet be silent, oblivious to our visual investigation.

Sculpture in bronze - 2007-8 edition

“The world is miraculous without our filter of rationalism, but as soon as you try to express that in words, it immediately turns into mysticism.” ~ Juul Kraijer

In photography, Juul is inspired by Surrealist photography where she can employ alienation, mirroring, fusing of incongruent beings, objectifying body parts and/or casting an incredible snare of shadows. She is also inspired by *fin-de-siècle (end of the century especially nineteenth century) medical photography and Julia Margaret Cameron photography. For some photo shoots, Juul hired animal trainers to supply the reptiles, snakes and owls as they were specially trained to be draped on bodies and not be provoked by the human presence or of the glares of the photo shoots. Her photography like her drawings are concise and share the qualities mentioned earlier.

Photograph-43.6x34.5cm-2013edition

Juul’s figures are more of an abstraction or an apparition than an individual in flesh and bones. They are in a transitional zone somewhere between the transient and the timeless. It could probably be that searing desire to unite with the Universe which of course is unattainable unless one conquers the discord within.

*fin-de-siècle medical photography – In the second half of the nineteenth century the new media of photography and film gave way to a new understanding about mind – psychology and psychiatry. They became the mirrors of the unconscious, capturing the inner state of people who were troubled which paved way for an indulgent understanding of consciousness and sanity. 

An Update as received from Juul Kraijer on 14-01-2019:

Happy to announce to my readers that Juul Kraijer has won the 3rd place in the Lensculture Black and White Awards 2018 for this series:

In April there will be an exhibition with works by the winners and finalists at Aperture Gallery in N.Y.C.

This is my second post for "Where Art Happens - Kochi Muziris Biennale 2018 series". The first post can be read HERE.

You can send your feedback to mail.huesnshades@gmail.com

profile pic- www.fondationdfguerlain.com

Ref & Images: http://www.juulkraijer.com/
(I've edited the first and third pictures for the post.)
some info from Lensculture and cttheory.net

Where Art Happens - Kochi Muziris Biennale 2018 - First Impressions

It's Biennale days in Kochi and one may find art everywhere - every nook and corner - if one has an eye for it (or even otherwise probably). The main venue Aspinwall and the neighbourhood is loaded with people from all walks of life enjoying art in all forms of it. Biennale commenced on 12 Dec and will continue until 29 Mar 2019. I made a short visit, need more time to go around, soak it all in. So here's the first glimpse and let me remind you these are not lasting impressions as you have to make your own and my own may change in the re-visiting(s) as well.

Anita Dube, the biennale’s first woman curator, has worked enormously to put together an array of artists and artworks keeping with the belief that “through the potential of social action, coming together, we ask and search for questions, critical questions, in the hope of dialogue.”

I was pretty excited when the names of the artists' were announced, the name that excited me THE MOST was William Kentridge who is very often described as South Africa's Picasso. I have always loved his works but had never in my wildest dreams had imagined that I would get to see his insightful work - a combination of figurative art, dance, music and mime. To be in the presence of such a work with so much history was is in itself 'a-pulsating-experience' for me! It is a personal response and not a commentary on the work itself. They are more like moving silhouettes that talk about the socio-political scenario of South Africa. His works reflect the aftermath of apartheid and colonialism and his landscapes are usually charred industrial and mining lands around Johannesburg. He uses drawings, erasures and re-drawings and films it. His projects are massive and yet they gloriously amalgamate the different aspects of visual art, theatre and performance, film into one decisive and ultimate work. Here's a small video-clip-

Then there are some other well-known names like Marlene Dumas, Sue Williamson, Anju Dodiya, Priya Ravish Mehra,  Guerilla Girls, Juul Kraijer, Shilpa Gupta, Monica Mayer and so on...

 Priya Ravish Mehra

Priya Ravish Mehra from New Delhi holds a special place in my heart, one of my favourites, for she was a humble human being laden with love and hearty laughter that would make one join in the mirth. I had the chance to meet her personally during the previous Biennale and she even accompanied me to visit our Community project which was part of a Collateral Project of 2016. She sat through my whole video, clicked a picture of mine, introduced a couple of friends to her and then I took her to some of the galleries near-by. I pay my homage to that Amazing Soul.
Priyaji was inspired by Rafoogari and her works were the beautiful testament to the weavers and their amazing craft of darning. She extended the idea of 'invisible' repair in darning by combining fragments of discarded weaves with paper pulp, reconstituting both fibres since they arise from the same source. Duality manifests as unity in her work celebrating the metaphor of 'reet' which stands for cosmic truth/order in the Indian philosophy.

Vocabulary - series of 20 drawings 

Ink and acrylic on paper

Marlene Dumas is a South African artist who now lives in Amsterdam. She is a prolific artist painting in Oils and Ink on paper. She stores all kinds of newspaper-magazine clippings which become the 'seed' of her works. Her subjects vary from children to unfamiliar adults to great personalities and the like. She uses the figurative form which has a phantom-like appearance, her technique more like swift, gestural watercolour washes, stains and delicately drawn images. Marlene's works here depict "small, inconsequential moments, objects and beings as an attempt to quieten our personal demons as well as those of the world around us."

 Messages from the Atlantic Passage

Glass. metal. water, wood. fishing nets

Sue Williamson is a South African artist whose work mentioned above recalls the historical past of South Africa welled up with heart-wrenching stories of the slave trade and apartheid and the reconciliation of the post-apartheid. "First shown at Art Basel Unlimited in 2017, the installation is a visual representation of the accumulated records of vessels responsible for transporting captives from West Africa to the Americas during the 19th Century – a journey repeated more than 30 000 times that was known as ‘The Atlantic Passage’. Williamson’s work recalls a small handful of those voyages. This remembrance takes the form of fishing nets, filled with glass bottles containing traces of earth, suspended above tanks of water. Each net represents one ship’s journey across the Atlantic. Every bottle, in turn, is hand engraved with information about one of the slaves on that voyage, including their African name, the new ‘Christian’ name given by the slaver, the country of origin, and the age, sex and height of the person. The installation is an extension of Sue Williamson’s acclaimed Messages from the Moat (1997), first exhibited on Okwui Enwezor’s 2nd Johannesburg Biennale, which listed the slaves brought to the Cape of Good Hope by the Dutch East India Company between 1658 and 1762."

 Rehearsal for an Apocalypse

Born in Mumbai, Anju Dodiya's works have been meditations on the artist as the self-referential protagonist. She adopts a wide range of art historical sources from Japanese Ukiyo-e prints, medieval tapestries, and Renaissance paintings to newspaper photographs. In Anju Dodiya's work, the viewer encounters the artist as a calm individual traversing through the infinite cosmos signifying her insignificance as a witness of civilizations past and present. I was primarily interested in her miniatures which I felt were self-reflective and said that they were "based on Bible reproductions construct images of fear that can be viewed as talismans to distance the fear."

"The Guerrilla Girls are feminist activist artists. Over 55 people have been members over the years, some for weeks, some for decades. Our anonymity keeps the focus on the issues, and away from who we might be. We wear gorilla masks in public and use facts, humor and outrageous visuals to expose gender and ethnic bias as well as corruption in politics, art, film, and pop culture. We undermine the idea of a mainstream narrative by revealing the understory, the subtext, the overlooked, and the downright unfair. We believe in intersectional feminism that fights discrimination and supports human rights for all people and all genders."
I couldn't have described them better. They are a group of anonymous activists who fight against sexism, inequality and racism in the art world.

 The Clothesline

Mónica Mayer is a feminist Mexican artist, activist and art critic whose work includes performance, digital graphics, drawing, photography and art theory. Her projects are always participatory or done in collaboration with other artists. She has continually devoted to bridging the complexities in different places across the globe. Begun in 1978 in Mexico City, 'The Clothesline' is the enactment of an ongoing participatory installation where the participants write their experiences from Kerala's recent floods and of sexual harassment heightened as part of the #MeToo movement and hang them on a clothesline - replicating the domestic act of hanging the laundry that many women share.

One of the artists' that impressed me most is Juul Kraijer as I could relate, feel connected to her frames. It was as if an extension of my own feelings! Juul Kraijer is a Dutch visual artist whose principal mediums are drawing and photography. She occasionally makes sculptures and video-works. It is definitely not an individual's story but expresses a frame of mind particularly that of the feminine psyche - the multitude of emotional and spiritual states as designed through the convoluted and knotted forms without much of a backdrop negating the sense of time and space. She likens them to "the Hydra, the multi-headed Greek mythological serpent," considering them "as vessels for open interpretation within the imaginations of whoever they encounter." And then there are other images where one finds animal and vegetation sprouting and/or mingling with the human form as if indicating the inseparable natural world. 

 For, in Your Tongue, I Can Not Fit - 100 Jailed Poets

Shilpa Gupta from Mumbai has studied sculpture from J.J.School of Arts. Her works are embedded with the message that we are all actors in the political forces that regulate society. Her work makes obvious the invisible threads that bind various factions of society together, often sensorily challenging her audience to occupy subject positions of the 'other', even if temporarily, to initiate an empathetic understanding. "For, in Your Tongue, I Can Not Fit - 100 Jailed Poets" expands on the artists' investigations of political borderlines, and how they exist beyond maps to the invisible mechanisms of control and surveillance. It points to how orchestrated oppression is harder to detect as it renders those imprisoned voiceless and invisible.

Ocha (Louder voice) - Detail

Mixed media sculptural installation

Vinu V V from Kochi is again a favourite of mine in this edition. He instils in us the sense of pride - coming from our own place (I haven't had the chance to see his works before though) - to see him displayed at this mega an avenue. He was also part of Shanghai Biennale. His installation takes you to a different realm - small and big at the same time. While on one end you have life-size wooden sculptures, in the middle of the room are 300 figurines nailed to the coconut tree trunks the reference clearly visible in Chottanikkara temple where women supposed to be possessed by spirits had to drive nails with the foreheads. Born into a Dalit family and having faced the harsh realities early on, Vinu is compelled to engage in discourses of social justice through his artmaking. Most of his works are structured around Dalit interpretations and re-readings of the social reformation that took place in Kerala by the end of 19th and early 20th century. 

Courtesy: have used excerpts from Biennale profiles

http://www.goodman-gallery.com/artists/suewilliamson
https://www.guerrillagirls.com/our-story/

Kala Samuha - an art marathon

Srishti- creation - is the essence of art. Coincidentally, an art gallery and an institution bearing the same name co-hosted the event, Kala Samuha – an art marathon; an amalgamation of creatives. Srishti Outpost of Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology, stationed in Mill Hall in Mattancherry has been the venue of several events organized as part of the Collateral project of Kochi Muziris Biennale. It was co-hosted by Shrishti Gallery, Hyderabad under Lakshmi Nambiar. Around 100 artists’ took part to spur this creative force in the second week of February. Painting, installation, sculpture, video and performance art under one roof for 3 consecutive days. Each artist had 40 minutes to showcase his/her art. The aim to bring in more talents and project their creativity – for both art students and professionals alike. It was a platform to connect with different artists’ and different forms of creative expression.

A few pictures from Kala Samuha, courtesy Srishti Outpost page and the Curator Meena Vari.

Another event of Srishti Institute of Art, Design and Technology's Video Vortex XI – Video in Flux: Art, Activism and Archives is happening from Feb 23^rd to 25^th in No.18 Hotel, Fort Kochi and Mill Hall Mattancherry.

Srishti's concept note reads as:

“Srishti Outpost @ Mill Hall is a space that masquerades as a classroom, a gallery and a community hall. It will focus on the performative, the playful and the process oriented while supporting the various positions of art making. Outpost @Mill Hall celebrates ‘Making, as an Expanded Form of Expression and Engagement’. The curated program overlaps and intersects in, material and mediums, Art & Science, traditional and contemporary as well as multiple associations and collaborations. The idea is to bring together artists, curators, theorists, technologists, traditional makers, and the local communities to interact, share and learn. ‘Outpost@Mill Hall’ will be a series of events; exhibitions, symposiums, permanent installations, workshops and a live makers’ space, will ensure a thorough involvement of audiences, both as participants, as well as spectators.”

Kashi 2016 Project

Kashi Art Gallery is working on a community based public art project regarding women conceptualized and curated by Tanya Abraham with Gigi Scaria, a collateral of the Kochi Muziris biennale. The first discussion took place on 26^th of July. It’s a process that would continue until Dec this year. Local women are working on a biennale collateral project, “Can I call you back?”, whereby art becomes a medium of expression and community connection.

Tanya Abraham is a journalist, author and administrator who is the creative director and curator of Kashi Art Gallery, Fort Kochi. She has worked on numerous projects focussing on skills of artists to enhance poignant concepts. She is also the founder-director of The Art Outreach Society, a non profit organization working towards social and individual change using art as a tool. Author of ‘Fort Cochin, History and Untold Stories’ she was nominated for the contribution to the restoration of a historical Dutch building to an economically viable project by UNESCO in 2010. Currently she is pursuing her Masters in Arts Administration from the University of Kentucky, USA.

Gigi Scaria is one of the famed contemporary artists, basically from Kothanallur who lives and works in New Delhi. Gigi Scaria’s work draws the viewer’s attention towards the painful truths of migrancy and displacement. The issue of non-belonging and unsettlement reverberate between the walls on his canvas. Gigi Scaria’s art focuses on issues surrounding the implications of the city’s rapid urbanisation approach. Highly experimental, he works with several media such as installations, video, photography, painting and sculpture. He is also involved with welfare projects and expresses activism through art for social and political change.

Tanya, Gigi, Sujith, Gayathri, Madonna, Deepa Anil Sivadas, Devi Nayar, Marian Paul, Sarah Pamella John, Shridha, Jorjeena, Yashi, Asiya, Sonya Elizabeth Bobby Antony and myself, were the participants of the first stage of discussions that took place amid the old world charm of Old Harbour Hotel in Fort Kochi which was renovated with the effort of Tanya Abraham.

'Women Power' - Participants of Kashi 2016 Project

Tanya Abraham (first from right)

Most of us misconstrue feminism for anti-male. This often distracts and deviates the attention from the genuine issues at hand and ultimately undermines the cause too. While the truth lies in the fact that feminism is just meant to empower women, still the weaker sex in many parts of the world how much ever we may try and be vocal for equal rights in every arena of ‘her life’.  It just means to be compassionate, support, co-operate and uphold one another without letting down the sorority which is the need of the hour, more so now. Instead of ‘toxic femininity’ (as captured in a photo by Tanya from the San Francisco based school bulletin board where her son studies which by the way exemplifies that not even the much-thought-of-advanced-places are exempt from such backlashes and back stabs) we should concentrate on embracing femininity in all aspects of the term. This project of ours is such a venture where we wish to support and care for our fellow beings just by acknowledging their presence, by hearing out what they have to say and make them heard if possible just the way it is; without much ado or drama that life may or may not offer. Some ‘exist’, some ‘try to live’ and some rarely ‘live’. It is only a natural want to live our lives to the fullest and to yearn for what one actually deserves is something terrible and tragic.

The project entitled “Can I call you back?” was aptly gauged by Deepa Anil Sivadas who said that not every call has to be taken and answered. We, women, tend to feel guilty if we do not respond to each and every call. This isn’t fair for we do have a choice to answer, to reject or to call back later. It doesn’t apply only to calls, literally. It is so much more metaphorical here. 

Marian Paul, an advocate by profession and as a member aware of all the legalities and the contexts that keep popping up in her career time and again, voiced her strong opinions which were poignant. She is much closer to the happenings than perhaps any one of us. A point comes where everyone has to choose between career and home and that sets the context as to whether she would be valued and respected or otherwise reminisces Marian.

While Devi felt that the institution of marriage is in itself wrong and that the woman should have the liberty to choose whether to marry or not in the first place. She asserted that the marital status of a woman should not be questioned nor should it be the base for a woman’s identity. Sarah mam’s personal tale on “Whose house is this?” (when she inherited her ancestral home) was interesting and made the air lighter. Definitely a breather! (while it must have made one to really think on why a women who “inherits” is someone that society can’t accept or digest)

Yashi and her family’s sense of liberty changed with place which shows the strong hold of the environment we live in, Asiya’s thoughts on a woman always being inadequate wherever she is ( in job, home or anywhere else) is thought provoking.

The most aching was when one them concluded in a line that "I forgot you" after the partition of their property. Minimal, yet all effective in the sense that one could sum up the pain with such grace. I could feel the immeasurable ache in that statement.

Attentive ears!

When Tanya referred to the hairline thread of balance that every woman has to face in her life to either strengthen or to give up on something that pertains to social conventions, the way women treat other woman particularly if she is successful and single are all that happens almost every day, gossiped about and yet nothing positive or constructive ever come out or paves way for it. Though Gigi confesses that this is his first women’s issues’ based project his ideas brim with charged vibes already, with definite directions that he wants us to pursue. As he said, we may start with one idea, a solo statement or any particular incident and it could just spread wild and catch up with a whole lot ending up in altogether different zone but ultimately a satisfying one. 

I personally feel that women in Kerala are far better off than women in many other parts of India for they do extend their freewill in a way that others cannot. In our society girls are taught irrespective of being rich or poor, at least in these parts. Yet we have miles to travel, I agree. The differences begin from birth and we have to become conscious of our attitude – beginning from the immediate family; father, mother, relatives, friends...slowly and gradually change can be brought about. But it has to be a conscious one. Equality cannot be taught, it can only be emulated. If both the boys and the girls receive the same kind of treatment, obviously it will be passed on in the same manner. What one receives is what one gives. Women are under-rated, under-treated and expected to be submissive even to the extent of being objectified. Only when that image of woman as object is transformed can she herself get to the path of transformation. The responsibility thus lies on the shoulders of the entire society – each and every member.

This is definitely an open-ended discussion and a lot can happen, be unearthed and unhappen... so we are open to suggestions, personal stories and everything along those lines. We are in the process.

Photo courtesy: Sujith P R