Society and its cultural mores are undeniably interlinked

[1]

The protests in Delhi post the brutal gangrape on December 16; a graphic art by a woman artist — AP, official website

New years should start on high notes, but this time it was a tough start. Politics notwithstanding, what we saw at the level of the “aam janta” post the Delhi gangrape was nothing short of the beginning of a social revolution.

My only fear is that it shouldn’t assume the shape of a civil war with growing aggression and so many situations that are not right about our social and economic fabric. The economic schism between the haves and have-nots and large-scale migration, leading to breakdown of social pressure groups, have often been cited by experts as some of the reasons for crimes. I am sure it is all this and more that impel people to commit acts of aggression, especially against those who are unable to protect themselves.
After the Billa-Ranga killings of brother-sister duo Geeta and Sanjay Chopra in the 80s, hitchhiking in Delhi, especially by women, virtually stopped and has not revived till date. Just as well. I wonder what the long-term changes these reports of rapes from across the country will have on the movement of women and their psyche. Many women who were quite gung-ho about zipping out at late hours independently are making a lifestyle change of avoiding going out at night unless absolutely imperative. I dread to think that we have to look upon every male, however close, with suspicion. It is not a nice way to live.
It is a proven fact that cultural mores are an intrinsic part of keeping the social fabric intact and aggression at bay. Artists or NGOs who work within jails or even with mentally disturbed children have often reported that art is often an outlet that can go a long way in soothing frayed mental spaces.
I recall that Shatadru, one of the first shows that I had curated in the mid 90s, had works of 54 women artists cutting across folk, traditional and contemporary genres. And what I found was, to my own surprise, that the concerns were shared, as were some of the manifestations. Be it childbirth, child rearing or violence or social concerns of for instance water — excess or lack of it — like drought, floods, or fetching it from afar, the intrinsic concerns of art by women remained unchanged. I remember distinctly how Madhubani women artists instead of depicting wells, started drawing handpumps and taps in their works. I will never forget one work that even had a Lord Shiva with a polluted Ganga. There was another work which looked like a filmstrip with two women smoking — one a village woman smoking a cigarette and an urban babe smoking a bidi! Another work of an artist from a sleepy hamlet Molela, which specialises in terracotta wall sculptures, depicted a steam engine polluting the countryside and even an aircraft on a wall tile.
Contemporary women artists have been bolder in exploring their sensuality and even sexuality with nudes and some works of shock art with phallic imagery and menstrual blood, etc. Which again brings one back to how mindsets are revealed through art. I wonder if these women who are painting nudes are so very pre-occupied with their fingers and toes, warts and all, are giving vent to their repressions? It will be interesting to ask a psychologist to “de-code” the art of women in psychological terms and see how deep rooted are the similarities and repressions — collective or individual.
Equally interesting will be to see how male artists fare in psychological terms? Will anyone drawing beautiful women be looked upon with suspicion? Or for that matter, any artist depicting women in not such good light, be perceived a potential rapist? I remember the old Chinese blessing that translated means, may you live in interesting times, but sometimes, no news may not be such a bad thing after all.

Dr Alka Raghuvanshi is an art writer, curator and artist