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Art of Liberation by Shilo Shiv Suleman
- Style Essentials Edit Team
- Oct 9
- 3 min read
Updated: Oct 12
This October, New Delhi in India will see Travancore Palace open its doors to Art of Liberation, an exhibition put together by artist and activist Shilo Shiv Suleman. It’s the first official showing under the Fearless Foundation for the Arts. The dates run from October 16 to 21, 2025. The opening evening begins at 6:00 PM, and from October 17 onward, visitors can walk in between 10:00 AM and 8:00 PM. There’s no entry fee.
The show gathers artists from different corners of South Asia. Each of them looks at what liberation might mean in their own world — sometimes through protest, sometimes through memory. Fire appears again and again: not as ruin, but as a sign of change, of something breaking open so something else can start.
Working with Curatorial Advisor Myna Mukherjee and Co-host Tara Lal, Suleman brings together voices that cut across place, gender, and politics. After years of working internationally, the Fearless Foundation returns to India for a show that links art to lived experience.
During the week, one evening will include live sets by Aamir Aziz, Shruti Vishwanathan, Mahi G, and Delhi Sultanate — performers known for work rooted in protest poetry and sound.
Among the participating artists, Krisha Joshi from Nepal presents Guardians of Mukkumlung and the Yakthung resistance, a visual salute to the Limbu community’s effort to protect their sacred land from development.
From Pakistan, Luluwa Lokhandwala reworks the sacred Alam into The Shia Alam reborn as a phoenix of resilience, reflecting on identity and endurance inside Karachi’s Bohri Shia world.
Ahsana Nasreen Hoque Angona from Bangladesh shows Women warriors leading Bangladesh’s revolutions, linking decades of women’s activism — from 1971 until now — in one long thread of resistance.
Vicky Shahjehan, a trans artist from Sri Lanka, uses henna to map the country’s 2022 Aragalaya protests. Her piece Henna flames lighting the Aragalaya struggle turns skin art into a record of uprising.
Suleman herself contributes Women of Shaheen Bagh standing guard over India’s democracy, recalling the women who led one of India’s most peaceful and symbolic protests.
From Myanmar, Chuu Wai Nyein, now living in France, paints Girls playing with snakes, fearless in the face of terror — made after the 2021 military coup, showing courage inside everyday play.
Zahra Khodadadi of Afghanistan brings Twisted wreckage as testimony to war’s aftermath, part of her series Made in Where?, using wrecked cars to trace what war leaves behind.
And from Iran, Negin Rezaie’s A queer lion of resistance, inked in henna and poetry reinterprets the ancient lion symbol through the chant “Women, Life, Freedom,” shaping it into something fluid, neither male nor female.
In the end, Art of Liberation isn’t about any single country. It’s about how artists turn survival into expression, and how those expressions travel further than borders ever could.
Exhibition Details
Venue: Travancore Palace, New Delhi, India
Dates: October 16 – 21, 2025
Opening Night: October 16, 6:00 PM onwards
Hours: 10:00 AM – 8:00 PM daily
Entry: Free and open to the public
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