Suppression of sexuality - Wardah Naeem Bukhari

Wardah Naeem Bukhari

Suppression of sexuality (I) (Work Displayed at Nakanojo Biennale, Japan, 2019) Description

Theme is based on Suppression of Female Sexuality because of cultural and social constraints and pressures. The choice of video was based upon capturing an everyday movement in its purity and simplicity.

I want to use every day act as a metaphor, because the kneading flour becomes a substitute for the suppressed expression, since when a woman handles the flour in different states and stages, it becomes a metaphor for handling body and body organs. The movement of hand, which on the surface is about doing a domestic chore, has undercurrents of pleasure sought by fingers, similar pleasure which is experienced or envisaged during a sexual intercourse, encounter and fantasy.

Thus the video in its edited version would allude to that link between female task and the female fantasy, which are intertwined, because a woman in her marriage is supposed to perform both acts or services, providing food to her husband and offering her body for his pleasure. Thus in the video I try to suggest how the singular act of a woman can have a possibility and potential for her private pleasure, without the presence of her male counterpart. In a way it is a celebration of woman’s freedom of body and her freedom from male dominance.

Suppression of sexuality (II) (Work Displayed at Nakanojo Biennale, Japan, 2019)

The lack of education and rationality in our culture has made our women traverse two paths simultaneously. On one hand they have a natural life as human beings with all its pleasures and pains and on the other there is the cultural life with its own restraints and preferences, which are often in conflict with natural yearnings of human life. My work highlights a domain where the conflict between natural and social life is most pronounced. It is the sexual domain of our women, which goes through a continuous suppression. The sexual desire is natural but its fulfillment requires cultural validity. Many of our women do not find an opportunity of cultural validation and as a result their sexual domain suffers.

My work highlights this suppression by portraying fantasized sex objects, which are a substitute to sex toys in rural areas. The sexual fantasy associated with such objects, which may include vegetables and fruits or something similar to male sexual organ requires a perspective, a need and a choice. My work is a 3 minutes’ video that brings to focus the perspective and thought process that goes into it buying vegetables and fruits. It describes their inferences not only in object selection but also its value as pleasure commodity in an environment where such acts are considered extremely shameful. Thus in the video I try to explore the one possibility of sexual gesture. I want to use domestic act as a metaphor, because to buy vegetables and fruits or to make it ready for cooking or eating them becomes a substitute for the suppressed expression, since when a woman cuts the vegetables and fruits in different states and stages, it becomes a metaphor for handling body and body organs. Thus in the video I try to explore the one possibility of sexual gesture.