PROFILE

Vasvi Oza

Email: vasvi.oza@apu.edu.in

Vasvi is an art practitioner and researcher interested in the areas of education, print culture, childhood and literature for children. She is a trained artist, interested in bringing her practice and research together in the process of addressing the questions of her fields.

Her PhD thesis is titled ‘Imaging Childhood: Locating the Emergence of Modern Gujarati Child in the Print Culture of Early twentieth century Colonial Gujarat’. She has explored and examined the pictorial reproductions that formed a major part of printed texts for children in mainly Gujarati periodicals and textbooks. This research exploration resulted in findings that suggested how the questions of representing a ‘Modern Gujarati’ child within the instructive and leisurely material produced for children, resonated with the larger socio-political movements of that time, i.e. Nationalism, Revivalism and National Education.

She has contributed articles, picture stories and illustrations for Chakmak, a children’s magazine published by Ekalavya, a Bhopal based NGO. As part of Different Tales project, she has illustrated the Malyalam folk tale Poochakurinyar. She is also one of the co-founders of BlueJackal an online platform for comics, graphic narratives and illustrations.

Currently Vasvi is exploring the possibilities of an integrated Arts Education programme for the primary and elementary school education in India.

Academic Qualifications

• B.V.A (Painting), M.S.U, Baroda. 2005
• M.V.A.(Painting), M.S.U., Baroda. 2007
• PhD (Visual Culture and Film Studies), EFLU, Hyderabad. 2015

Teaching

• Creative Expressions
• Art and Education

Areas of Interest

Painting, Illustrations, Book Making, Zines, History of Print

Research Interests

Print History, Archive, Comics Culture in India, Textbooks

Publications and Writings

• Questions of Reading and Readership of Pictorial Texts: The Case of Bhimayana, a Pictorial Biography of Dr. Ambedkar, The Journal of Writing in Creative Practice, Volume 4:3, pp. 351-365, UK 2011
• Picture Books, Zines: Laal Pahad, published by Ekalavya. Bhopal. 2018.
• Eent, with Jagdish, published by BlueJackal. 2018

On-going Projects

Workshop for Art Education at APF Schools