🇬🇧Shakti Shalini

Hello again! So it turns out I’m not very good at regularly keeping a blog, something that the piles of abandoned journals and diaries I have should probably have warned me about, but I’m back now! Hopefully this time for longer.

This post is not about traditional crafts or Alice in Wonderland, but it something I am nonetheless really proud of and wanted to share.

I recently began volunteering at Shakti Shalini, a delhi based NGO that works with survivors of sexual and gender based violence across India, and thanks to some very lucky timing, I arrived shortly before the launch of their research report Unkahi, the unspoken, a qualitative research on natal family violence, which they invited me to illustrate.

You can read the full report, with accompanying illustrations here, and learn more about the NGO on their website.

In this post, I am just sharing the illustrations, additional explanations, and my thoughts on them which are not in the report.

There were two types of illustrations that I did- three large full-page ones for the beginning of each “section“ of the report, and 9 smaller ones to accompany some of the testimonies of the research participants. (For this all to make a little more sense, I recommend looking at the full report linked above to see the illustrations in their context!)

All the illustrations were done digitally in black and white with additional details in red, a colour I chose for its connotations of danger and power, as well as its eye-grabbing nature which was useful to highlight the important elements in some illustrations.

As with any art, there are definitely things I could improve, especially when it comes to anatomy (hands and feet my dreaded enemy), but given that I had a week to do them all in, I’m nonetheless incredibly proud of the results.

Full-Page Illustrations

Illustration for Section I: Why this report?

This is the first illustration I did, and still the one I’m happiest with.

As the research reveals, domestic abuse from one’s natal family is just as likely to be committed by a female family member than a male one, and so I chose to show both parents on either side of the girl, possessively clutching her shoulders.

The motif of the shadows is one that I used throughout these illustrations, to show the darker, threatening side of the characters and as well as certain things I was not comfortable with drawing such as physical and sexual abuse.

Illustration for Section II: Salient Findings: Highlights

This next image was meant to illustrate the false safety that one’s natal family can present; the bed of roses representing the supposed comfort, but the thorns showing the reality of painful entrapment that one’s family, as is discussed in the report.

This is actually the one I drew last, and as I had already passed my deadline, the drawing looks a little rushed compared to the first one. That being said though, I’m still pleased overall with the concept and how it came out.

It is in section two that all the testimonies is and their accompanying illustrations are located.

Illustration for Section III: Recommendations.

This is the last of the full page illustrations, where the girl is breaking free. This seemed to be one of the favourites of the audience at Sunday’s launch, and there is certainly something to be said for simple emotive imagery. One of my favourite things about this one is the swirls on either side of her, because they look a bit like stylized wings. This was a complete accident, I just wanted to add a sense of movement where she is pulling the bars apart but it adds an idea of her about to take flight which I really like!

I chose to place this, the most empowering of the illustrations, at the start of the section of recommendations as it is these recommendations that could enable women to escape the abusive environments they are trapped in.

Testimony Illustrations

Part of the report is the testimonials of the research participants some of who’s stories I did my best to illustrate. I’m not going to give too much context here because I want you all to read the report, so I’ve written the participant’s name in bold and the section in which the passage can be found.

Rumi’s testimony (Young women’s sexuality and parental policing)

Despite the anatomical inaccuracies here, this illustration is one of my favourites, especially with the detail of the phone taking a photograph.

In this passage the exchange of a shopping list gets wildly blown out of proportion thanks to someone taking a photo.

For inspiration for the figures I looked at paintings of Romeo and Juliette‘s balcony scene by various artists

Shanno’s testimony (Forms of violence)

The passage deals with a girl whose mother’s cousin raped her with her mother’s full knowledge.

It was to me one of the most heart-breaking testimonies to read, and I knew immediately that I wanted to illustrate it, but was unsure as to how.

In the end, I settled on the suggestion as a pose to a more literal interpretation- with the shadow of her abuser looming over her and her mother turned away from her.

This illustration was I think the most well received among those who were familiar with the report, and I must admit that I am particularly proud of this one- I think it gets the message across and incites the biggest emotial response out of all of the pictures.

From an aesthetic point of view, I also really like how the shadow lapping onto the figure of the little girl came out.

Bhavya’s testimony (Same sex relationships and natal family violence)

In Bhavya’s story she speaks about the concern she had for her partner when she introduced her to her family, and made them write and sign a letter to make sure nothing bad would happen to them.

Another one I’m pretty pleased with, I especially like their facial expressions and the hands holding the paper! For some reason though, this was also the illustration that took me the longest time to draw, by quite a long way. I must have redrawn their arms about thirty times.

Also fun fact for the Ghibli fans out there- this pose was inspired by the ending of Princess Mononoke when San and Ashitaka are holding up the forest spirit’s head :)

Neelam’s testimony (inter-caste / religious marriages and natal family violence)

This illustration shows Neelam catching her mother making her “medicinal“ tea after she has found out about Neelam’s relationship with a Hindu man.

I don’t mind this illustration, however Neelam and her family are muslim, which I neglected to show in the drawing. If I could go back and redo it, I would change both figures’ outfits to reflect this crucial detail.

Akanksha‘s testimony (marital rape and natal family support)

Akanksha’s husband would force himself onto her, but when she confided in her mother, she was told to back to her him and stop complaining.

This is another illustration that I thought would be best illustrated in a more suggestive way, with the possessive shadow of her husband wrapped around her. I tried to show her sense of helplessness in her expression and the fact that she is clutching her kurta.

Faiza‘s testimony (Help-seeking challenges)

This illustration is meant to show Faiza‘s attempt to escape her abusive household, but being caught and followed be her brothers.

This is one of two extracts from Faiza that I illustrated, the second being directly underneath this one.

I didn’t draw these illustrations in order though, and didn’t notice that this testimony was also Faiza’s, or I would probably have drawn her the same as below. However I don’t think this is much of an issue- due to confidentiality, I don’t actually know what any of the survivors look like, my goal was simply to give faces to the story to make them more emotive, and also these are stories that could, and do, happen to a diverse range of women, so maybe it’s better that I didn’t have the same woman twice.

Faiza’s testimony (encounters with the “the system“)

In this passage, Faiza tries to complain to the police about her family but instead is ridiculed by them.

Although the gender of the police is not specified in the extract, I spoke to one of Shakti Shalini’s workers who told me that female police officers may actually be just as bad if not worse than their male counterparts when it comes to taking women’s statements of abuse.

Though I can’t say I’m displeased with this illustration, it is probably my least favourite of the lot- namely due to the off anatomy of all the figures (her legs and feet are far to small), but also because it was amazingly hard to give the policemen’s shadows smiles without making them cute. I tried everything! Big mouth, small mouth, wide mouth, thin mouth, teeth, no teeth, everything! I settled with this one in the end but am not entirely convinced I succeeded in making them more threatening than cute.

Still, this isn’t to say that I’m unhappy with it, the fact that I managed to create 11 illustrations in a week is more than I need to be proud.

Once again, here is the link to the report, in case you can’t be bothered to scroll all the way back up.

And a massive thank you to everyone at Shakti Shalini for letting me be a part of this great project, I am really so grateful to have had thi

Alright, that’s all from me for now. Hopefully it will be less than three months before my next post!