Aged 27, I am an artist, writer, educator and sculptor, building and honing skills and discourses to create and empower myself. Self-employed for the last three years of my life, I strive to enhance my capacity for self-sustainability through my skills and artistic expression. Through my artistic practice, I try to embody self-expression in a way that highlights strength in vulnerability, and the power of reflection and critical thinking in defying outdated, regressive thought and institutions. I believe that my approach to productivity, independence and reframing of what success and ambition truly mean to me is a way that I shift the narrative of the powerless and oppressive prerogative allotted to the identity of a young Dalit woman of Adivasi descent, or even the ‘Backward Caste’ identity. I am also an occasional model, trying to reframe the narrative around the socially accepted understanding of beauty and override the Casteist/Brahminical/Indian patriarchy driven feminine aesthetic.
