Gender Equality Now!: ‘Marilyn Guevara’ comes to Karachi

The poster is one of the creative and amusing entries on display at the Arts Council.

KARACHI:

Add a hint of mascara, a dash of eye shadow and a bit of lipstick to an iconic image and Che Guevara becomes Marilyn Guevara - a hilarious but brilliant character who is out to wage war against chauvinism instead of capitalism.

A poster featuring Marilyn Guevara, created by Les Hamecons Cibles from France is on display at the Arts Council along with several others as a part of the ‘Gender Equality Now!’ exhibition.

It has been organised by Poster for Tomorrow, in collaboration with Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) and the Arts Council in order to raise awareness about rights for women in an amusing and creative manner. This is the second Poster For Tomorrow exhibition organised in Pakistan. Last year’s theme was the right to education. The best 100 entries from across the globe submitted to Posters From Tomorrow have been put on display.



‘Facial’ by Kevin Aderland from Singapore 

The organiser of the exhibition, Khuda Bux Abro, said that he was satisfied with the turnout on the first day and hoped that even more people would drop in the next two days of the exhibition. Two of the posters on display were made by Pakistanis. Though they did not make the cut for the top 100, they were amongst the best 300 of the 3,020 entries from across 105 countries. “We put them up for display to encourage the youth of Pakistan,” Abro told The Express Tribune.



‘Emancipation?’ by Agnieszka Olszewska from Poland

Amarnath Motumal, the vice chairperson of HRCP’s Sindh chapter told The Express Tribune that the poster exhibition was an excellent idea. One of the posters he particularly admired was made by Estelle Yu from Singapore. It showed a Jenga tower with the gender symbols inscribed on the blocks. A hand was shown pulling away one of the blocks with the female gender symbol on it, threatening to cause the whole tower to collapse. Take one wrong out and the entire structure collapses, he said. “There should be no difference in equality.”



Untitled by Monika Prus from Poland

Zohra Yusuf, HRCP’s chairperson, said that this year’s topic was especially important for Pakistan, which has stagnated when it comes to women’s rights. Her favourite poster was also the one with the Jenga tower as well as ‘Marilyn Guevara’.



‘She’d Get the Job Done’ by Fanny Winardi from Australia 

The exhibition will remain on display from 10am to 7pm till Wednesday.

Published in The Express Tribune, December 11^th, 2012.

View more pictures from the exhibition here.