Priya HAnda

Priya Handa Expresses Solidarity  through Art

Exploring Resistance and Revolutionary Art, Sharing the Delegation Experience | By Christy Wise

Priya Handa remained in Palestine/Israel following her July 2015 IFPB delegation to work with Palestinian and international artists on a community mural in Silwan, East Jerusalem. “It taught me a lot about resistance art and revolutionary art in different countries,” Priya said.

“We [outside of Palestine] are communicating to people who have not seen the experience. We make images of women and men suffering,” Priya said. “Palestinians are looking for hope amongst all this chaos and all this heat…There is more light and more hopefulness in it.” Priya now tries to incorporate more lightness in her art.

Community art drew Bay Area artist/activist Priya to Interfaith Peace-Builders in the first place. As one of the artists who worked on the Oakland Palestine Solidarity Mural, she introduced the mural at a gathering of IFPB delegates who spoke about their delegation experiences.

“I ended up staying for the whole report,” she said. “Every minute, I was so amazed to hear the stories. I was shocked to hear the stories and encounters of people who’d been on the delegation.” She went home, researched upcoming delegations, and submitted her application. “The next thing I knew, I was going.”

A South Asian artist, Priya focuses on expressing the struggle and conflicts of South Asian communities. In college, her involvement with Students for Justice in Palestine broadened her interest to include conflicts in the Middle East. “I hope to use art as a form of expression to better articulate the conversation between the nations where words are not being heard by each side,” she explained.

Art Forces, the sponsor of both the Silwan mural and the Oakland Palestine Solidarity Mural, aims to contribute to social transformation by using art and media to build and strengthen relationships, activate public spaces, and engage and move people to work for a better world.

Complementing Priya’s work on community murals are her smaller works on canvas and personal artwork. She connects deeply, however, to larger, collective pieces. A mural “allows you to create a dialogue with a community and allows community members to have ownership of their piece; artwork that they’ve worked on together,” she said. Plus, when you paint outside, passersby stop and talk about what you’re doing, Priya observed. “For those five minutes of dialogue, that person has forgotten their job they have to go to and issues they have at home. Art helps them experience life and not just try to survive life.”

Traveling with IFPB was “very powerful,” Priya said. “The delegation itself was very well put together. They gave us experiences in different areas. There were a lot of human rights talks. You got to see settlers and their presence in the communities…It definitely puts things in perspective.”

Check out more of Priya's work here: http://www.priyahanda.com.