BENGALURU: As British Council turns 70 this year, celebrations are being held across South Asia. Here, in India, after celebrations were carried out in Chennai, the British Council in the city will be putting up a host of performances and workshops by various artists. As a subset of these celebrations, the ‘Kadak Team’ will be putting up a talk on understanding women and gender in comics, by Aarthi Parthasarathy, along with a zine-making workshop by Garima Gupta.
Webcomic creator and filmmaker, Aarthi Parthasarathy will talk about the history of women in comics. How it evolved in the west and influenced the women characters and the creators of that time. “The current comic form started in the late 1800 and is practiced to the current day,” she says.
Emphasising on the importance of initiating a dialogue on women and comics, Aarthi says, “It is important to talk about women and their contribution in the various fields of art. This is something that comes up in the talk - how women have historically been denied access, they have been denied participation as the audience and even as creators.”
Talking about how women were and are still perceived through artistic narratives, Aarthi says, “Women as characters have had to fight against the stereotypical perceptions that were attributed to them, of being the damsel in distress for example.” Talking more about this fight, which is being fought to this day, she says, “It’s been a long journey for women in any form of art. We are particularly looking at this aspect in graphic
narratives.”
Kadak collective will be organising the reading room talk by Aarthi, along with a zine-making making workshop by Garima Gupta. Technicalities of how to make zines, and distribute them, will be taught at the workshop. Garima says, “We are doing a DIY pop-up, which is open to everyone. However, there is an RSVP for the workshop.
Kadak collective is a group that was started by eight women. They deal with issues related to women and feminist ideas and the collective tries to highlight what women go through in their daily lives.
Kadak X British Council will be held on August 12 at the British Council Division, Kasturba Road Cross, from 1 pm to 6 pm. The event is free and open to all but RSVP is mandatory.