Walls whitewashed after female yoga murals defaced in Indian city

A recent viral video showing defaced artwork on a public wall in the central Indian city of Gwalior sparked outrage on social media and among activists.

In the video shared by a school student on Instagram last week, scratches and marks made on the genital area of ​​silhouettes of women doing yoga were seen.

In his post, the teenager said he passed by the murals every day and seeing black silhouettes defaced with white markings filled him with “anger and disgust.”

“This is not a harmless harm. This is a cheap thought, a dirty mentality and a deep disrespect. It is shameful, embarrassing and extremely disappointing that even a picture of a woman cannot be protected from such sick minds,” he wrote.

Video of the defaced artwork sparked outrage on social media; Many people said that the image “disturbed” them and that “women are not safe even when doing graffiti.”

The act of vandalism also made headlines; the media described it as “disgraceful”, “disgraceful”, “sick” and “an attack on women’s dignity”.

This week, city officials stepped in and whitewashed the wall, but activists say that won’t solve the real problem: the mentality that leads to sexualization of even female silhouettes.

In recent years, India has been promoting the ancient yoga practice by holding a global yoga day every year, and artistic graffiti of yoga poses has been painted in cities, including the capital Delhi.

The brightly colored murals in Gwalior, in the state of Madhya Pradesh, were part of a project to beautify the city.

After the student’s video went viral, the resident tried to resolve the issue.

College student and social media influencer Lokendra Singh painted over obscene signs with black paint.

“It takes a lot of courage to fix something, especially in a public space. But I thought someone had to do it,” he told the BBC.

After the video went viral, city officials stepped in.

Gwalior Municipal Corporation spokesperson Umesh Gupta blamed “some miscreants” for the defacement and said they could not be identified as there were no CCTV cameras around these walls.

He said they sent workers to whitewash the wall.

“Whitewashing is being done in some places and work is going on in a few other places where paintings have been defaced. We will get new paintings made after all the defaced walls are whitewashed,” Gupta said.

It’s unclear whether the restoration will bring back the original artwork. The civic authority organized a “street wall painting competition” on Sunday, inviting artists to help beautify the city. Themes listed include cleanliness, environmental issues, water conservation, dangers of tobacco use, and how to be a responsible citizen. He’s not talking about yoga.

The whitewashing of the wall was also questioned by some, noting that this approach perhaps missed the point.

They suggested that the solution was not to gloss over the problem but to address the mindset that caused it in the first place.

The young man who first shared the video told the Times of India newspaper: “The wall can be repaired and repainted, but what will be the mentality of those who objectify even the painting of a black woman?”

This is a much more difficult project to undertake, says Kalpana Viswanath, co-founder of Safetipin, a social enterprise that works to make public spaces safe and inclusive for women.

And the only way to do this is to engage young men, to make them realize that what they thought was harmless fun is hurting women.

“Even if we believe that the vandals in Gwalior were a group of men having fun and choose not to attribute any deeper meaning, this is a form of sexual harassment, whether it is done to women or to art in public places.”

Artworks depicting the female body or genitals attract attention not only in India.

Last year, German women’s rights charity Terre Des Femmes noted that bronze statues of women were being erected around the world. discolored breasts from being touched and rubbed.

There were also cases where feminists found works of art offensive and protested the male gaze. In a well-reported incident last year, a group of feminist artist-activists vandalized a 19th-century painting of a female vulva by French artist Gustave Courbet and called it “this.” misogynist.

In India, where men dominate public spaces and women’s access to them is “very limited and fragile,” what happened in Gwalior “adds to the list of things that further limit our access,” Viswanath says.

“There are so many things holding us back. Whenever something bad happens, families and friends force women to retreat. Our freedoms can so easily be taken away from us.”

But he says there is a silver lining in all of this.

“It’s good to see young women refusing to cower. What’s most encouraging is that these and similar challenges are coming from small cities and towns. For me, they represent the active voice of young women speaking out against patriarchy.”

“And the courage they displayed is remarkable.”