Art as Activism

Shilo Shiv Suleman is an award-winning Indian artist whose work intersects Magical Realism, Nature, Technology, Feminine Energy, and Social Justice. Her creations include paintings, wearable sculptures, interactive installations, and public art, rooted in pre-colonial Indian sensuality and earth magic.

Starting her career at 16, she had 10 books published by age 20. An INK Fellow, her TED talk garnered nearly a million views in 2012. Suleman founded the Fearless Collective, leading public art interventions in 10 countries with underrepresented communities.

Her work has been featured by Vogue, BBC, Nat Geo, and more, and exhibited at the Southbank Centre, Stedelijk Museum, and Sotheby’s. Notable installations include Pulse & Bloom at Burning Man and Grove at Google’s HQ. Her latest work, a brass cowrie shell sculpture, was showcased at the 2023 Architectural Digest Festival.

Mamta Sagar is a poet, writer, academic and translator writing in Kannada language. She has four collections of poems, Hide Seek, a collection of selected poems in English with the source text in Kannada (2014), Hiige Haaleya Maile Haadu (2007), Nadiya Neerina Teiva (1999), Kaada Navilina Hejje (1992), four plays, an anthology of column writing, a collection of critical essays in Kannada and English on gender, language, literature and culture, Beyond Barriers: Slovenian-Kannada Literature Interactions (Translation) published by Centre for Slovenian Literature, Ljubljana (2011), and three poetry films titled INTERVERSIONS, produced with Srishti Films as part of the Wales-India collaborative projects along with a compilation of collaborative poetry activities into a book (2018), to her credit. Preetiya Nalavattu NiyamagaLu, translation of Elif Shafak’s novel into Kannada (2017) for which she was conferred with Bhasha Bharathi Translation award.

Her writings focus on identity politics, feminism, issues around linguistic and cultural diversities. She is actively involved with international poetry translation projects like Literature Across Frontiers, Poets Translating Poets and Melding Voices etc. Art-Poetry installation project developed and co-curated by Mamta is on display at the Piccolo Museo della Poesia, Italy 2020. An yearlong (2023-24) Project 560 of IFA was granted to her. She is conferred with the International World Organization of Writers ‘World Literary Prize’ on the 6th of April 2024 in Abuja, Nigeria. She curates Kaavya Sanje, a community poetry engagement since 2013. Professor Sagar is Head of Studies, Creative Writing Programme, at Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design and Technology, Bengaluru.

Vinay K Sreenivasa is an advocate. He works primarily on constitutional literacy, urban governance and on the livelihoods of workers in the informal sector. He also worked in the intersection of urban transport and law. His work involves designing and conducting legal workshops (In Kannada and English), conducting research and writing. He is also part of a campaign for the right to protest in Bengaluru. Prior to completing his law degree, he was a computer science engineer and has been part of the IT Industry and part of a non-profit working at the intersection of technology and social change.

Divya has a background in public health and human rights. She has worked in the grassroots and digital space for climate, public health, and social justice issues for over 12 years.

She currently serves as the Executive Director at Jhatkaa.org, building an equitable, inclusive and sustainable India.

She manages a team of campaigners and techies running campaigns on on climate change, air pollution, gender & sexuality, womensʹ rights and social justice. Jhatkaa.org focuses on using innovative technology and public mobilisation to build an active movement of progressive Indians who take action to affect change that would not be possible if they acted alone.