When we started work on the Museum of Memories, we had several conversations about our interpretations of “heritage” and how it informs our gender identities. As individuals in the 18-25 age group, understanding what forms our personal and collective identities has taken on importance - especially in the midst of a global pandemic when it became crucial for us to look back and find grounding in our roots, which might remain unchanged. Still, we found that we could not look to the past for stability, because despite being on the other side of this project, the blanks in our histories continue to be filled every day. 

 

We as curators recognised that although there might be similar threads in our explorations beyond the masc-dominant, patriarchal narratives that the historical canon has followed, there was no one experience (or twelve experiences) that could speak for the collective. So we set out primarily to seek perspectives, of minoritised genders and sexual identities. This project is not a history lesson on heritage, but a repository of stories that look forwards and backwards at once, trying to place themselves in larger narratives to make sense of themselves. Can the same lens of a modern-day angry feminist be applied to her grandmother’s experience of an early marriage? Can the rigid gender norms of religion and religious spaces be chipped away at to pave way for more inclusive systems? And how does one gather the courage to bring up mental health in a project about a past that completely ignored its existence - until now.

 

You are invited to take time to engage with each contribution. To contemplate the stories and memory carried within ourselves; all the intergenerational forces, the nostalgia, and the tangible and intangible oddities that have been passed down over time. And maybe to open doors and dialogues to a deeper understanding of the things that form our worldviews, and our ideas of “self”.