The Christine Risley Award Winner 2021: Aarushi Matiyani

Aarushi’s work, Stitched Sedition, is a continuously growing archive on textile that records the district-wide network shutdowns in India. Having analysed open source data, Aarushi created a visual language that encoded district, duration, cause and networks affected by shutdowns. Addressing the vital issue of repression of democratic expression, the embroidery, and the act of embroidering, is at once both a means of archiving a story and a performative piece that facilitates a conversation.

Guest judge Katie Simpson (Curator, Jupiter Woods) comments, ‘Aarushi’s commitment to documenting the network shutdowns in India is an act of solidarity and protest that extends beyond the work itself; she performs - through her hands and bodily labour – her own blackout, by working ‘away from keyboard’ to archive the timelines of those excluded from the digital space. Aarushi is raising awareness through a time-based work that continuously evolves, lengthens and extends and I have a strong desire to revisit and spend time with the piece again. One for the archive, this work also acts as a vital map or data sheet, documenting a moment in 21st century history that can be referred to in the future. This is therefore an important work, exemplifying the power of art in engaging with the political and social issues of our time.