Abstract of the work- Mee believes that artist treat the mundane material in a way that separates them from other people using it. It is Mee’s passion to give new meaning, form and hence new identity to objects that have already lived a life. This is one reason why she often works with old, discarded objects in her Studio and Here she created a ‘Wall of Compassion’ from discarded fabrics with the women who accepted Mee as their own folk. This art work covering nearly 100 square feet of surface area created in 3 days by 15 women including Mee is a reminder of power of ‘collective-creativity’.
Picture Copyright- Archana Sharma/Goonj
Faith….is not an oft repeated word these days but anyone who is working against the odds knows the importance of this five letter word….FAITH. The faith reverberates in our consciousness to keep us going, keep us in doing what we believe in.
We saw that faith in us in the eyes of some people while working in India this summer. The gruesome three months of heat, dust and humidity. Imagine traveling and taking care of an infant in that weather but people’s faith in us kept us going and creating the artworks we had promised.
A picture gallery by Archana Sharma of Goonj
Undoubtedly we receive love and affection from people who invite but when a big organization, well known people invite us to work, it feels good.
It happened to us in the month of June. We were as usual working with people and creating artworks, a message came to the inbox of Jey asking if we want some clothes for our project. Mee (Meenakshi) had recently made an appeal to people on FB to donate black clothes for one of her upcoming project.
Picture copyright- Archana Sharma/Goonj
The message was sent by Meenakshi Gupta who is known to her friends as Better half of GOONJ (Goonj is headed by her husband Anshu Gupta) or the back bone of Goonj. We knew Goonj’s immense work since the days of Uttarakhand floods and later when Anshu got the Ramon Magsaysay award.
To know more about the tremendous path breaking work of GOONJ, one can go here
We went to meet Meenakshi Gupta and see the work of Goonj closely and figure out what we could do besides getting some clothes from them. We also met Anshu that day. A man of few words but have the electric presence of impacting your thoughts in very few words. He talks with precision, makes you feel important and the glint in his eyes can tell you that he can see inside you.
Meenakshi Gupta, on the other hand have a very different presence. One can feel the warmth when she is around. The best part was when they told Mee and Jey- “Create whatever you want to. We have seen your works.” That faith helped us in believing ourselves.
The meeting was set for thirty minutes but went on for the whole day. We saw what Delhi centre of Goonj does and their scale of work as well as impact area. (Goonj has 17 centers functioning all over India). So we decided to do something bigger with Goonj.
What Mee did ?
Those who follow Mee Jey and Jey Sushil, they wondered about the final artwork made in Goonj because we havn’t shared that artwork till now for various reasons. The work which Mee did there is one of the largest, intricate and beautiful works she has done till now.
As you know, When something is so precious, it takes time to share it with the world. But let us tell you how it was created with lots of love from the people of Goonj.
We realized that there are 80 women working in Goonj so Mee decided to work with some of the women for three to four days and create an artwork.
We went back after few weeks and started working with the women of Goonj. It was understood that we will work with clothes. We decided to choose discarded clothes which can’t be used in any other purpose in Goonj as Mee had to torn the clothes in order to create her art work.
The women who joined us on the first day decided to work with Mee for next 2 more days. They refused to leave the work before it finished. They worked like a community works- chatting, working, laughing, smiling, joking, singing and in between sipping tea and playing with our eight month old baby.
Mee got the frame made and then the real work started with the songs from the areas these women belong. The songs about God Shiva, Parvati and many more. Till the end, these women had no idea what it was going to become but they kept doing what Mee was asking them to do. In between, they looked impressed with what Mee can do with her hands in terms for giving shapes to the twisted fabric ropes.
By the end of third day, we were able to finish the two sided 9 feet tall and six feet broad free standing sculpture made of fabric and wood and love of all these women.
The intricate patterns can be interpreted in several ways but that should be left to people. Though Mee has her won interpretation but readers are free to interpret the work in their own ways.
Such a large work in so little time wouldn’t have been possible without the help of these women and the faith of Meenakshi and Anshu on us.
We believe this faith will take us a long way.
