What is art if it is not political? These captivating illustrations raise perennial but modern questions about what it means to be a woman today.

Text Credit: Rheanna Mathews

A look at canonical art shows more men as artists than women, and perhaps this fact may contribute to the argument that it is simply because men are better at everything, including art. This attitude elected to overlook the element of opportunity and how it was denied to women, choosing instead to belittle the subjects chosen by women for their art, terming them – with a snide curl of the lip – ‘women’s issues’. It took centuries for women to claim a place in the canon, and decades for them to reclaim their ‘issues’.
The feminist movement largely helped pave the way, and the social media revolution has ensured that women’s issues and their experiences are out in the open and cannot be ignored. Not only has this given rise to whole generations unafraid of repossessing their agency, it has also seen art itself become more diverse and intersectional.

The three artists featured here are unafraid to address issues that society is grappling with today, from perspectives that bring women and minorities to the fore. Their recognisable individual styles uniquely raise questions concerning the modern woman, her body, her sexuality, her very existence.

We are at a point in time when leaders of state repeal funding for abortion, government reforms do nothing to help and in fact actively make difficult the life of a woman, and mainstream society tries to fit her into a uniform box of their design…a point where the fact that she is a woman makes her a subaltern. From the striking, dreamlike scenes of Janine Shroff to the brightly coloured, eye-catching poster illustrations of Kruttika Susarla and Sreejita Biswas, the featured illustrations not a comprehensive look at these issues, but are from different points in the spectrum, with respect to the questions they raise, and in terms of the manner in which they are expressed.

Artist: Janine Shroff

Lesbians Riding Ponies

The Breeders

Blue Birds: Quick Sketch

Artist: Kruttika Susarla

In response to the government’s GST rollout and poor planning around women’s health and sanitation

Fanart for web-show, Fleabag, a dark comedy based on the notion of ‘a bad girl’

From The Feminist Alphabet series, contextualising feminism within the lived experience of women and minorities in India

Artist: Sreejita Biswas

A Beginner’s Guide to Indian Homophobes

Solo’s Sadventure Time: A lighthearted take on being a queer feminist with BPD in India

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) About Sex, Sexuality and Gender