Aqui Thami is a Janajati artist from the Himalayas, currently living and working in Bombay. She uses social exchanges and develops safe spaces to position art as a medium of healing in community, self-funding her work and realising it through collaboration. Aqui has a masters in Dalit and Tribal Studies and is currently pursuing doctoral studies alongside running community and art projects Dharavi Art Room and Sister library.
She started printing “seriously” in around 2013, when she produced a collection of posters that reclaimed public spaces and brought attention to the sexual harassment women face everyday in public spaces. Since then there has been no stopping Aqui, as she describes; “I love to make zines and then explored lino, screen printing, Risography, and cyanotype. I love printmaking, the fact that i can make multiples and share with more people is amazing. I could never go to an art school so I have learned everything myself!”
“I came to art to find healing, and in my practice, I am drawn to the ways art serves as processes of intercultural mediation,” explains Aqui. She works with experiences of marginalisation and resilience, both of her own and the people she works in collaboration with. With an ethic of social engagement and inviting viewers to inhabit and activate her works she explores and finds healing in community and finds inspiration in all the makers around her who continue to work outside the art industrial complex. “DIY (Do It Yourself) , DIT (Do It Together), and sometimes DDI (Don’t Do It) are the principles as well as primary mediums of my practice .They provide for merging of my life and my art offering an active engagement in both the public and the personal. Centred around the culture of self-publishing and guerrilla poster I believe in creating art that is grounded in the act of ‘doing’ and addresses political/social issues.”
One of her recent projects is the Dharavi Art Room; an artist-run centre in the heart of Dharavi that provides a space for children and (sometimes) women to experiment with art, read books, share, rest, and just have a good time. It is a space of learning and leisure, and since the pandemic, the space has served as a food pick up spot mostly where food, sanitary products, toys and art products are shared. “The lockdown measures in the country had us all locked inside our homes but the homes in Dharavi are small with way too many people, no ventilation or natural light and toilets,” says Aqui.
She runs and founded the space with Himanshu, an art school student who comes from similar economic conditions to the community. The art room was offered to them by a local woman, Shoba Didi, who conducted workshops and activities with them and her kids. “Before we had this space we would either work in the few open spaces in Dharavi like the bus depot, outside temples or at different ngo’s offices. The challenge with that was people reacted very differently within ngo spaces so even though it was nice to work under the fan it was not ideal, whereas when we would be working outdoors the girls, in particular, felt not very safe and would huddle together.”
They soon realised that for the kids to feel happy and safe they needed a space where no one would bother them and they could carry on with their work without fear. The duo started looking for spaces, and then Shoba Didi offered them a spare room with fair rent and no deposit. Aqui comments on the project; “Kids are very inspiring, their plans and positivity in spite of everything is what inspired me.”
Alongside Dharavri Art Room, Aqui also runs Sister Press, a project which she describes as “wholesome and lovely”. “I had never dreamed of having access to Riso but here we are,” says the printmaker. Under Sister Press she publishes a fortnightly community newspaper called Sister Times, monthly zines called Sister Zine, and also provides open access for women to use the machine and the library as a resource centre. Sister Library is a space to celebrate works of women; “We are based in Bombay, but we also travel to different places. The space has been doing so well I think the biggest win is that it is completely independent meaning it has no funding from anywhere but the community. The library is entirely volunteer-run, at a time when ownership is valued so much just exiting as a community owned and community run space is a huge success in my opinion.”
Currently, Aqui is working on Covid relief fundraisers and on-ground relief work, as well as a publication of the Sister Radio book that has conversations from her podcast in different indigenous and Indian languages. She concludes; “So many plans for the future lets see how we do with the pandemic first”.
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