YOYI! Care, Repair, Heal, Gropius Bau 2022
MAASINYA DASTOOR series “How have we stood up against injustice? How do we maintain our claims to our traditional areas and territories that have been stolen from us in the name of development and conservation? What position will Tharu indigenous people take in an ever-changing world?” The work Maasinya Dastoor (2015–present) is drawn in ink and pen inspired by the form and technique of the traditional Godana/Tika (tattoo) culture to heal pain in the community on Lokta paper. The scrolls form an archive that tells the unofficial history of Chaudhary's community. The word maasinya means "enslavable and expendable" and refers to a dastoors from different period, in which the Indigenous people were categorized as an "enslavable alcohol-drinking group" in the Muluki Ain (Civil Code) of 1854. The artist overlays images of Tharu life over prints of colonial resolutions from Nepalese history. This shows how h...