Per°Form Open Academy of Arts and Activations 2024 Presentation — My Story is Yours As Well, and If I Listen, I Can Hear Your Voice in Mine by Ujjwala Maharjan

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Synopsis

In her presentation, weaving poetry and songs from her collaborative feminist music project, Ujjwala invites you into a journey through the legacy of women — mothers, ancestors and contemporaries — whose lives and stories have made her. Through the practice of remembering, and the privilege of putting them into words — written and spoken — her work seeks to exhume and unsilence these stories. In this presentation, she reflects on how reclaiming these stories into existence, creates firm grounds to further build legacies.

About Ujjwala Maharjan

Ujjwala is a Kathmandu-based poet, performer, and educator. She is one of the co-founders of Word Warriors, a poetry group leading the spoken word movement in Nepal. She has been exploring arts activism and community-based education programs focusing on storytelling through varied creative mediums. Inspired by her students and colleagues, she started experimenting with rap during the pandemic. Collaborating with other artists, she blends Nepali ethnic music into the soundscape of punk, hip-hop and musical monologues and tells stories of women’s bodies, sexuality and liberation. Writing in English, Nepali and the ethnic minority language, Newari (Newah), she is interested in subverting the language and culture of misogyny in Nepal.