Kiran Dayal

This Foundation Project implemented by IFA under Explorations will engage 25 women from Self-Help Groups from Satwas, Madhya Pradesh, in reclaiming public spaces through exploring leisure with gatherings, potlucks, music and game sessions as a way of building solidarities. Kiran Dayal is the Coordinator for this project. 

Kiran Dayal is a Delhi-based social designer, and development practitioner who has worked with gender development, inclusion, education, and menstrual health. She completed her BFA in Painting from Arunachal University of Studies, Namsai in 2018, and Master of Design in Social Design from Ambedkar University, Delhi in 2021. Kiran is interested in building human-centred design interventions to enable tangible social impact. She is a Visiting Faculty of Social Design at the School of Design at Doon University, Dehradun. In 2021, she was an SBI Youth for India Fellow, when in rural Madhya Pradesh she designed and implemented a project related to sexual, reproductive, and menstrual health using game-led-change narratives. Given her experience, she is best placed to be the Coordinator of this Foundation Project of IFA.

The project titled Ghar ki Mukhiya ki Baatein is an attempt to reclaim public spaces and explore leisure by 25 women residents and members of Self-Help Groups in Satwas, Madhya Pradesh. They will organise small gatherings and potlucks in farming fields while playing local music and outdoor games, and engaging in small talk. The Project Coordinator has been working on a project on women’s Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH) with these women and gained their trust. Most of the women in the group come from farming and tailoring backgrounds. Through Participatory Art, these gatherings will lead to the making of an A3-sized mixed media artwork in pencil, clay, ink, paper, and cloth. There will be 25 copies made which will be printed, framed and given to each of the women. The project will emphasise building rapport and community participation.

The outcome of the project will be the gatherings of the women, the mixed media artwork created by them and its 25 framed copies. The Project Coordinator’s deliverables to IFA with the final report will be audio visual documentation of the artistic process, and an image of the artwork. 

This project suitably addresses the framework of IFA’s Arts Practice programme in the manner in which it attempts to broaden the horizons of art by bringing it closer to lived experiences of rural women through exploring the necessity of leisure and sisterly solidarities within strong patriarchal contexts. 

IFA will ensure that the implementation of this project happens in a timely manner and funds expended are accounted for. IFA will also review the progress of the project at midterm and document it through an Implementation Memorandum. After the project is finished and all deliverables are submitted, IFA will put together a Final Evaluation to share with Trustees.

This project is made possible with support from Sony Pictures Entertainment Fund.