feminist praxis from south asia

This space on my website is dedicated to feminist praxis in contemporary art and architecture from South Asia. As a new endeavour, it will evolve and take its own shape and format. I hope that you will bear with me as it does!

The visual, curatorial, textual, sonic, moving image, architectural, design, and practices that do not conform to labels. The friendships, partnerships, collaborations, mentorships, and unexpected run-ins that we carry with us as committed arts professionals. The cultural work that is done from the margins or behind the scenes. What our solutions are to problems that we are committed to untangling in the long term.

‘Praxis’ = the ways we work, the evidence of our efforts informed by specific thinking and theoretical stances.

I often refer to practices that demonstrate principles of the Feminist Killjoy Manifesto by Sara Ahmed, as proposed in her publication Living a Feminist Life (2017):

• I am not willing to make happiness my cause.

• I am willing to cause unhappiness.

• I am willing to support others who are willing to cause unhappiness.

• I am not willing to laugh at jokes designed to cause offense.

• I am not willing to get over histories that are not over.

• I am not willing to be included if inclusion means being included in a system that is unjust, violent, and unequal.

• I am willing to live a life that is deemed by others as unhappy and I am willing to reject or to widen the scripts available for what counts as a good life.

• I am willing to put the hap back into happiness.

• I am willing to snap any bonds, however precious, when those bonds are damaging to myself or to others.

• I am willing to participate in a killjoy movement.

All opinions are mine unless explicitly stated otherwise. This is purely a space of knowledge exchange and discussion.

Currently, I nor any external contributors receive funding for our content on this blog nor is it monetised.

I respect ethical practices of citation and copyright attribution as much as possible. If you notice something that has not been cited properly or not attributed to its copyright holders correctly, please let me know.

Comments, questions, and concerns are welcome via email.

Acknowledgements for support in words of encouragement, mentorship, and friendship: Anuradha Senanayake, Devni Wickramaratne, Dumesha Wimalasiri, Gangulee Walpola, Harindi Jayasuriya, Jyoti Dhar, Kaumadi Jayaweera, Mineli Karunaratne, Natasha Ginwala, Pamudu Tennakoon, Rasudula Dissanayake, Ruhanie Perera, Sabih Ahmed, Sanuja Goonetilleke, Shahdia Jamaldeen, Dr. Shermal Wijewardene, Sharmini Pereira, Veeranganakumari Solanki, and Vinuri Wickramasekera