Delhi’s Khoj exhibition searches for socially engaging art practices

Khoj’s exhibition in Delhi attempts to reimagine social art by looking at gender-based violence through creative lens

It is not easy to break the cycle of gender violence and women cannot do it alone. While it requires immense courage and guts on part of the victim to come out with tales of sexual harassment and assault, giving voice through artistic frames takes the battle to another level.

Khoj, a Delhi-based not-for-profit contemporary art organisation, has incubated the quotidian experiences of women and their acts of resilience against violence through 14 community-based projects from across India. Walking past the works is like bearing a witness to events, generating a sense of healing and catharsis and showcasing the vigour of collective action.

Titled Threading the Horizon: Propositions on World making through Socially Engaged Art Practice, the exhibition brings together socially engaged artists and theatre practitioners, who have tried to thread together the possibility of equitable futures across social and cultural horizons on their canvasses, says Pooja Sood, founding member and director of Khoj International Artist’s Association. Formed 25 years ago with the objective of engaging young artists in art-based community projects, the association aims to create inclusiveness and participation.

The projects pry open the everydayness of gender-based violence, says Manjiri Dubey, the exhibition curator. “It makes a way for an alternate framing of overwhelming experiences through the creative lens of artists, who have put the issue in the public realm to guide us on how to confront the culture of violence against women.”

The women of Gram Art Project, for instance, is a group of farmers, homemakers, artists and local villagers of Paradsinga in Chhindwara district of Madhya Pradesh, who have showcased a collection of clothes made from organic cotton, sourced in part from their own fields.

With different ideas and identities, they have connected their thoughts in a collective space to highlight their concerns of living and working in any average Indian village that suffers poverty, undergoes migration and remains steeped in superstitions.

It is the individual interpretation and iteration of clothing projected in the art work that haunts and reveals the stories of violence and the unjust practices that women have been facing silently. “Besides being a platform of expression for their concerns, it is also about sustainable clothing,” says Manjiri.