Artists Explored Femininity and Craft at Shakti Exhibition in Chennai

In Chennai, a special art exhibition titled “Shakti: Threads of Female Power” opened as a celebration of women’s strength, creativity and cultural expression. The show featured textile-based artworks and installations by a group of international artists who used fabrics, threads and traditional techniques to explore ideas about femininity, resilience and identity.

Organised at the Alliance Française of Madras in collaboration with the Goethe-Institut Chennai, the exhibition brought together works inspired by regional textile traditions and creative approaches to material, form and meaning. It was timed to coincide with International Women’s Day, adding extra significance to its focus on the female experience.

The event included not just visual displays but also workshops on weaving and textile practice, a flea market showcasing handmade crafts, and community-oriented activities like a women-only dance floor. These elements were meant to create an immersive experience that connected audiences to both the craft and the ideas behind the pieces.

Curators said the aim was to highlight how cloth and thread have long carried stories of women’s work, intuition and creative labour — and how contemporary artists can reinterpret those connections in ways that speak to shared histories and ongoing struggles for agency and recognition.