Apertures: A creative portrayal of Domestic Violence (2021)

Apertures: A creative portrayal of domestic violence is a bricolage of stories and art forms. It draws on a variety of artistic disciplines to represent a spectrum of lived experiences of domestic violence in our societies, and the specter of patriarchy that shapes them. It tells four survivor stories from Minnesota through the lens of survivor stories in New Delhi and Chennai. The poems that represent these stories are fictionalized tellings of the poets’ own experiences of the routineness of violence in the structure of caste as practiced in India and within the institution of marriage. The poems (by Rumki Basu and Meena Kandasamy) were juxtaposed with personal survivor portraits offered by SEWA-AIFW – a nonprofit committed to enhancing family wellness among South Asians living in Minnesota. Read alongside each other, this piece expands the vision for violence-free and self-determined lives.

“The process of creating this piece was absolutely replenishing. The soundscape for the poetry has been designed to be carried by the voice, rather than by instruments. The visual elements were made to evoke emotion through textures, showing the feelings of the stories, in addition to the words. Being able to put a range of experiences and different forms of representing these experiences into dialogue with one another gives us, and this piece, an energy and connectedness that feels empowering. I hope that the revitalizing affects of the creative potential of looking at selfhood as a relational phenomenon can be experienced by all who are watching.”

Sound design | Voice | Composition: Ritika Ganguly
Shadow Puppetry | Visual Art Direction: Alia Jeraj
Commissioned By: SEWA-AIFW