Jalkonya Performance জলকন্যা কৃতকলা
Dhaka
Bangladesh
জলকন্যা/Jalkonya (Water Woman)
কৃতকলা performance
মনিকা জাহান বোস যুগোল বন্দিতে প্রিমা নাজিয়া আন্দালীব
Monica Jahan Bose in collaboration with Preema Nazia Andaleeb
Two women weave an ecofeminist performance and dialogue using the body, water, and saris created with women farmers of Barobaishdia Island. Preema: “The sari represents women. Women, saris, and water are part of nature. The performance explores these ideas in a crowded public space in Dhaka.” Monica: “Women are burdened with carrying water long distances and suffer the brunt of the impacts of climate change, floods, and cyclones. The piece speaks to women’s solidarity.” The performance links rural and urban women in a river of saris moving from Dhaka University to the National Museum and onwards, with the public invited to join along the way.
৫ই ফেব্রুয়ারি, ২০২৩ বিকাল ৩টা, চারুকলা থেকে শুরু
February 5, 2023 @ 3:00 pm, starting at the outdoor space at Dhaka University Faculty of Fine Arts.
অনেক ধন্যবাদ চারুকলার সকলকে এবং প্রত্যেক অংশগ্রহণকারীকে। Thank you to all participants. Special thanks Dean Nisar Hossain and everyone at Dhaka University Faculty of Fine Art.
Participation from DU faculty and students, One Billion Rising Bangladesh, and Sangat.
Social engagement and social media: Zaid Islam
Photography: Shefali Akhter Shetu
Bios:
Preema Nazia Andaleeb, a prolific and provocative artist of Bangladesh, is also an entrepreneur and creative activist. Her tactile imagery, contrasting approach to create visual tension is an instinctive, intuitive and powerful weapon to challenge stereotypical thinking which is an act of her self-preservation as a woman. Her multidisciplinary
works were represented in Bangladesh National Pavilion at the 58th Venice Biennale in 2019.Her works have been showcased at Asian Art Biennale, Fukuaka Museum Residency, Tashkent Biennale, Istanbul Biennale, Venice International Art Expo (2010, 2012, 2014) along with prestigious art fairs (Art Basel Miami, Tuyup Art Fair/Istanbul, Dubai Art Festival, Dhaka Art Summit, Delhi International Art Festival), gallery and museums. Her curatorial projects include several large-scale international expositions (Bangladesh, USA,
UK, France). Preema Nazia and her highly experimental practice believes that life is a panoramic saga which depicts a myth yet to be born, evolve and transform. Her performance provides sensuous relief in abstract distillation of complexity, textual collage & dream in destruction.
Monica Jahan Bose is a Bangladeshi-American artist and climate activist whose work spans painting, printmaking, film, performance, and public art. Her socially engaged work highlights the intersection of climate, racial, gender, and economic injustice through co-created workshops, art actions, and temporary installations and performances. Bose uses the sari — a precolonial 18-foot-long unstitched garment that is always recycled and never discarded — to represent women’s lives and the cycle of life on our planet. She has exhibited her work extensively in the US and internationally (20 solo shows, numerous group exhibitions, and more than 25 performances) including solo exhibitions at the Bangladesh National Museum and MACRO Museum of Contemporary Art Rome. Her ongoing collaborative project STORYTELLING WITH SARIS with women farmers from her ancestral island village has travelled to 10 states and six countries and engaged thousands of people. Her work has appeared in the Miami Herald, the Washington Post, Art Asia Pacific, the Milwaukee Sentinel, the Honolulu Star Advertiser, the Japan Times, and all major newspapers in Bangladesh.
