ladies log • 2022

16mm multi-projection performance

Ladies Log emerged from long, languid afternoons spent together on a shared rooftop, talking about our experiences as women navigating and negotiating public spaces. In each other’s presence, we found room to express and absorb discontent—even rage—reflecting on how the heightened awareness of being ‘looked at’ has become almost internalised by our minds and bodies. We ventured out with our cameras with an intent to observe and document the public landscapes in the city. The sights we encountered in the process were mostly dominated by the presence of men– occupying space to idle, with an ease and entitlement so unfamiliar to us– making us wonder where women go to be idle?

While performing this piece, we transform the stage into a rooftop, a space both private and exposed. Using clothes drying on a laundry line as our screens, three projectionists loop and overlap images, revealing what we witnessed in our process of documentation, while a performer idles on stage, at leisure. Ladies Log is both a documentation and an act of quiet defiance to take up space.

The visuals are shot on 16mm film, hand-developed by the makers, along with the use of physical interventions and found footage — created with Namrata Sanghani, Tanya Dixit and Sheba Alexander, at the Harkat Lab.

Ladies Log previewed at Alpavirama Film Festival 2022, NID, and has since been performed at Harkat Studios' 16mm Film Festival 2022, Serendipity Arts Festival 2022, Goa, and Kathiwada City House in Mumbai.