Boxed: Exploring Containment and Resilience in Times of Crisis

Abstract

This article draws upon materials created between May and July 2020 as part of an artistic collaboration between the two authors which took place during the first COVID-19 lockdown. The authors worked together remotely, drawing on their personal and professional experiences to explore the themes of identity, migration and belonging in times of crisis. One of the strongest themes to emerge from the collaboration was the importance of individual and collective resistance to the deeply gendered social and political categories that ‘box us in’, and serve constantly to remind us of our place and how we should – and shouldn’t – behave and be. As mothers, grandmothers and wives. As migrants, artists and academics. And as women.

Keywords

• gender
• identity
• categories
• resilience
• arts
• migration