An Exhibition by an Altadena Videographer Illuminates Women’s Lives in Pakistan
Beginning in October 2023, filmmaker Jennifer Hall Lee from Altadena traveled throughout Pakistan for five grueling weeks in order to capture the lives and struggles of women there.
Currently, a photo exhibition featuring her work is on display at Pasadena City College. Public viewing of “Women without Borders: A Visual Study of Pakistani Women’s Lives” will take place in PCC’s Boone and V galleries from 1 to 3 p.m., Monday through Friday, until August 2.
Lee, who is a member of the Pasadena Unified School District Board of Education, remarked, “The diversity of women is amazing in Pakistan.”
Hina Abidi, the former head of the Pakistan Arts Council in Pasadena, and Munazza Yaqoob, members of the Critical Thinking Forum of the International Islamic University, Islamabad (IIUI), followed Lee.
The women traveled from the rocky highlands of Chitral to the parched deserts of Umerkot. As they traveled, they stopped in a number of places to interview women and record their perspectives on feminism, patriarchy, the women’s movement, and the future.
In the course of one such interview, Lee inquired about the ways in which Pakistani women understood themselves to be distinct from American women. The surprise response she received was that women in the US are free to travel. Lee, curious, wanted to know what they meant.
“You have the liberty to select your career,” Lee recalls them saying. Additionally, you are free to go anywhere you like on your way home from work without worrying about being met by anyone.
According to Lee, the word offered her a clearer understanding of how patriarchy persists, particularly in the present environment where women’s rights are being curtailed everywhere, even in the United States. Certain states have attempted to prevent women from traveling across state lines to get an abortion following the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, which had been the nation’s legal precedent for decades.
That struck her as a matter of “freedom to roam,” stating that everyone has the right to both physical and mental freedom in their lives. “We must possess the capacity for expansive and creative thought.”
The team printed their pictures on jute after getting back home, and the women at Behbud Crafts of Islamabad, a nonprofit organization that promotes women’s empowerment, hand-sewn the borders.
Their stories came to life through carefully chosen video clips taken from the interviews, which were reproduced to go with each picture.
The Pakistan Council of the Arts in Islamabad hosted the group’s debut exhibition of their work in November 2023. At PCC, it is currently on display for the second time.
According to Lee, the foundation of her initiative is a 2018 Fulbright grant she was awarded. The United Nations Association – Pasadena has provided extra support for the display, which has been made possible by a Community Excellence Grant from the Pasadena City College Foundation as part of PCC’s Centennial Celebration.
