Feminist multimodality: A retrospective account of an exhibition on speculative urbanism

Abstract

This essay offers a retrospective account of a multimodal public exhibit at the end of a multi-year research project on speculative urbanism. While the registers of speculation are invariably forward-looking, our research presented us with the central place of memory as a frame through which urban residents in Bengaluru, India, negotiate their present and imagine the possibilities of the future. This essay examines four ways in which we created space for memory in our exhibit, understanding our approach as situating an archive-optic, drawing on approaches of critical fabulation, object perception, and submerged perspectives. I suggest that these forms of engagement are multimodal and that they offer feminist and decolonial ways to unmaster linear narratives and situate our research affectively.