kusama pyjamas
Titled for Yayoi Kusama, who is the cat's pyjamas.
(via Art & Photography: Sunil Gupta | Feature Shoot)
Sunil Gupta is an Indian born artist and photographer based in London. Queer is his first monograph and offers a comprehensive overview of his work from the 1970s to the present. For decades he has explored narratives of contemporary gay life; tackled issues of gender and sexuality; and documented his own experiences living with AIDS. Queer is published by Prestel and is available on Amazon.
(via http://www.imaanlibrary.org/photo_5755861.html)
Red Threads by Poulomi Desai and Parminder Sekhon.
This is an insightful photographic book by two very different photographers, Poulomi Desai and Parminder Sekhon, tracing their contrasting portraiture work over the last 20 years. The images historicise and explore layered and complex issues of sexuality gender race class and identity within a political framework, with essays by Sunil Gupta, Cherry Smyth and Raman Mundair. Published by Millivres Press, supported by Usurp.
Book available through Desai’s site + events news for her arts collective & gallery in England.
Southern Siren - Maheshwari (from the hijra fantasy series) by Tejal Shah.
Description: Maheshwari is a hijra identified woman. I met her in Bombay during my research on hijra’s while working on the project, “What are You?” I was struck by her loud laughter, sense of fantasy and belief in magic. Her desire was to become a south Indian film star and see herself in a song and dance sequence, romancing the hero and to be romanced by him.
Watch a video below where Shah talks about the series:
Trailer for “I Am” (documentary by Sonali Gulati) (by iamdocumentary)
I Am is a feature-length documentary film that chronicles the journey of an Indian lesbian filmmaker who returns to Delhi, eleven years later, to re-open what was once home, and finally confronts the loss of her mother whom she never came out to. As she meets and speaks to parents of other gay and lesbian Indians, she pieces together the fabric of what family truly means, in a landscape where being gay was until recently a criminal and punishable offense.
(via creatrixtiara)
(via artraaga.com » Queer Sunil Gupta.)
Vadehra Art Gallery has released its latest publication Queer Sunil Gupta. The book is in collaboration with the international publishers Prestel. It follows from the Shilpa Gupta monograph published by the same in 2010. This is an international monograph on a very important Indian photographer and features selections from each of his major series from 1970s onwards, offering a comprehensive overview of his works to date.
Gupta is also a well-known artist, curator and writer. For decades he has explored narratives of contemporary gay life in India and other parts of the world; tackled issues of gender and sexuality; and documented his own experiences living with AIDS.The hardcover 140-page publication with 80 colour illustrations has an illuminating essay by Canadian curator Keith Wallace and a conversation between historian Saleem Kidwai and Sunil Gupta. Above all it chronicles Gupta’s divergent photographic series that range from narrative portraits to fictional photo essays.
‘Windmills of My Mind’s post on the launch night in London here
Sunil Gupta discusses his photo-book Queer and tells Shana Maria Verghis how gay issues in India and US differ, the latest developments on Section 377 and that it is still hard to find a place to hang out with his tribe in Delhi.
On July 2, 2009, a provision in Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code which criminalised sexual acts of adults in private, was struck down. The verdict was that it violated the Right to Equality, Protection of Life and Liberty. Photographer Sunil Gupta, who also works with the queer collective Nigah, explained that, “We recently went to the Supreme Court again, because many petitions were filed against the judgment by religious and extremist groups. But now there is a recess for the summer break.”
In collaboration with Vadhera Art Gallery, Gupta brought out collections of various photo-documentaries he shot over the years in a book called Queer. This provides glimpses into gay communities in India, US and Europe, among whom he has lived and worked.
Gupta had moved to US to study in the 60s, when the country was in flux of the Civil Rights Movements, feminism and Gay Pride marches. A mood he said he feels in India now, where he returned to settle in 2005. He told us, “It is like I’m reliving my youth.”
Dear Friends, For many years - since I came out as being lesbian/queer - I have been thinking about the visual representation of ‘queer women’ in popular culture, visual art, media and the public realm. Often, I have toyed with the idea of making images that reflect the intimate and daily experience of women who love women.
Living in India, this has often been a difficult proposition since it is extremely problematic for women to be OUT (visually) for varying reasons of safety that could lead to loosing jobs, apartments and fracture further the relationship with our families, friends and general social interaction and mobility. This is true for queer women in many parts of the world.
Therefore, while many of us make self-portraits, have intimate photos of ourselves or our partners and friends, daily life record etc, these are mostly restricted to the privacy of our homes and shared with a handful of people. How then to represent a wide range of images of queer women from different parts of the world? Images that reflect ourselves, our lovers, partners, familiars, alternative families etc. while being able to reflect gender, sexuality, race, culture, ability and age?
One possible answer came to me as I was looking through the holiday photos of friends, pictures they had taken of themselves (auto-portraits) on the beach at dawn. Suddenly I felt so delighted to simply see images of a dyke couple on holiday! That kicked started – Queer women take a holiday! Pictures taken by us for ourselves - record, and documentation of our lives - the way we choose to make it.
So please, I request you to send me at least one holiday photo of yourself - either alone, with your former/current lover/s, partner/s, familiars (human or non-human), and friends or family (with their permission of course). I propose to compile the images I receive from you into a book (no publishers as yet, but I am looking) and possibly into a web archive. via :::Project:::queerwomentakeaholiday:::
What a great concept re: snapshots as a ‘conspicuous by abscence’ queer signifier! The project is by Tejal Shah, a multi-disciplinary artist from India and Melbourne. As far as can tell it’s ongoing, click for details.
The Blank Noise Project is a community arts group that started in Bangalore and has spread to cities throughout India.
Their most active project at the moment is “I Never Asked For It”, demolishing the idea that women who experience street harassment (often called “eve-teasing”) are to blame because we’re dressed slutty.
“Blank Noise wants you to discard the clothes worn at the time you were sexually harassed on the streets. This collective building of an installation of clothes seeks, primarily, to erase the assumption that you ‘asked for it’ because of what you were wearing. The popular assumption is that the girl is to blame because she was ‘provocatively dressed’, implying that ‘immodest’ women are eve-teased. Clothes are contributed with a note by the volunteer which explains the circumstances under which they were harassed and includes a usually intimate description of what the participant was feeling, thus acting as an outlet for a kind of purging of experience as well.
Sarojini Naidu (1879-1949)
Sarojini Naidu was a famous Indian poet and a major freedom fighter who went on to become the first Indian woman to be appointed the president of the Indian National Congress and the Governor of any state in India. She was a noted child prodigy and a master of the children’s literature. Naidu was given a sobriquet Bharat Kokila (The Nightingale of India) on account of her beautiful poems and songs. Some of her best books that established her as a potent writer include The Golden Threshold, The Gift of India, and The Broken Wing. An active participant of the Indian Independence movement, Naidu joined the national movement taking Gandhi’s call and joined him in the popular Salt March to Dandi. With the Indian Independence in 1947, Sarojini Naidu was made the Governor of the Uttar Pradesh in recognition of her contribution to the independence movement.
Artists becoming leaders = auto-reblog. The correlation between culture and society.
The talk starts with discussing Bharti Kher who works with the symbolism of the Bindi, and it’s associations with marriage of third eye. Also, Chitra Ganesh and the gender politics of comics.
THE BANGALORE QUEER FILM FESTIVAL (BQFF 2010) is calling for submissions. The deadline is 30 January 2010. Details here. The festival will be held at the Alliance Francaise de Bangalore on 26, 27 and 28 February 2010. The BQFF 2010 is a non-ticketed free event aimed at providing a venue to screen films based on themes related to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender or intersex (LGBT or Queer) communities across the world. This is the second edition of the Bangalore Queer Film Festival. The event is presented by Good As You (a support group for LGBT people, est. 1994), SWABHAVA (a non-profit organisation working with LGBT issues in Bangalore, est. 1999) and WHaQ! (a support group for queer women, est. 2009). While sincerely apologising for this short notice, the organisers request you to send in films for consideration/preview as early as possible. For more information please contact the organisers at blrqueerfilm fest[at]gmail.com.
