Exhibition on menstrual taboo, sexual violence held

 Kathmandu, May. 7: A solo art exhibition titled Bidambana at Classic Gallery in Patan by artist Rukumani Shrestha concluded on Friday. 

The art exhibition  had begun on April 10 featuring 40 artworks created through ‘Itching print’ format. Shrestha’s artworks shed light on how women are unkindly treated during their menstruation cycle. 

Artist Shrestha said that she was distressed after hearing/reading news that  women in Sudurpashchim are kept in cowshed during menstruation.

In the rural areas of  Sudurpashchim, women are kept in a cowshed (called chhaupadi) during mensuration, considering they are impure during the period to stay 

at home. The artworks were the reflection of her own experiences as well as how women are being persecuted in the name of various superstitions and sexual violence.

   Although she was born in Kathmandu, she had also been treated as impure during menstruation which caused her mental and physical pain, she reminisced. According to her, the artworks depict how menstruation is still prevalent in our society and how patriarchal beliefs affect the physical and mental condition of a woman.

Artist Shrestha has sensitively expressed through her art the bitter rejection she suffered at home during her menstrual period and the immense mental anguish caused by sexual harassment at public transport and other places. 

Her works have expressed the irony of worshiping women as goddesses on the one hand and keeping them in the cowshed during menstruation as unholy women. Shrestha said that women in Nepal are victims of menstruation as well as sexual harassment in every place and every environment.

The purpose of her artworks was to convey the message that menstruation is not impure, it is a natural process and that violence against women of all kinds must be stopped, she said.