NEW DELHI: The sight of a woman unwinding, even though routine, is an act that is often laced with scrutiny in society. Leisure—the state of enjoying one’s free time—happens to be yet another privilege that is constantly denied to this gender. From watching television when no one is home to spending time with a friend, a woman often has to cautiously set aside moments of rest amid time spent on labour. Their act of leisure, however, is never really “socially-recognised”.
Identifying and responding to this gendered nature of the act of resting, Surabhi Yadav (31) started the photo project ‘Basanti: Women at Leisure’. Her chronicles seek to document the serene moments of women enjoying free time, thereby contributing to the feminist discourse of labour and leisure.
From personal experiences
Yadav decided to pursue this project post the demise of her mother Basanti in 2013. Her absence made Yadav—who runs a venture called Sajhe Sapne to upskill and provide jobs to women from rural India—realise how little she knew about her. “I only knew her as my mom and not as a person.” Consumed by both grief and guilt, she decided to delve into her mother’s past. Friends and neighbours made striking observations about her mother. “My neighbour told me that my mom was the goofiest one, but I never associated the word funny or goofy with my mother. That really surprised me. I realised that I had never paid attention to that side of her,” shares Yadav. Prompted by such lived experiences, Yadav decided to unravel the politics behind the idea of leisure from a gendered lens.
A radical issue
In a world where women struggle for unpaid labour to be recognised, leisure also becomes an idea of conflict, thereby radicalising the entire act of being idle. “Leisure is such an obvious thing yet it seems like a luxury. It is so ordinary and so fresh to our imagination, that it is quite radical. Since time and labour are feminist issues, leisure becomes a feminist issue too,” she comments.
The sight of a woman resting in her house, watching the television, or going to the market meets a critical gaze from those around her. “There are two ways of winning a battle. One way is saying ‘I am going to fight it and win it’. The other is ‘I am going to become bigger than the battle, I will refuse to respect the rules and patterns of the battle’. Leisure belongs to the latter. It feels like breaking away from those rules,” adds Yadav.
While the project includes crowd-sourced photographs as well, Yadav is very particular about the images that are included in the series. “In urban spaces, we have a tendency to romanticise poverty. When people send me photographs, I look for consent and context. The person in the photo must know their photo is being clicked and will be published as well as there is context to what is happening in the photo.”
With over 400 photographs and videos, Yadav’s project—a a repository that contributes to feminist discourses—has also been used for academic research.