Striking images of women gagged with tape and naked female bodies – except for body paint – await attendees of the third annual My Body My Choice anti-gender-violence exhibition.
Striking images of women gagged with tape and naked female bodies – except for body paint – await attendees of the third annual My Body My Choice anti-gender-violence exhibition.
The exhibition opens at 7pm on Monday at the Nuns’ Chapel on the Rhodes St. Peter's campus. It is timed to set the mood for Women’s Day and will feature a special dance performance by Rhodes final-year Masters choreography student, Nadine Joseph, and her collaborators.
My Body My Choice celebrates women’s freedom to make choices regarding their bodies and sexuality, as well as to take a stand against sexual violence and discrimination. For the rest of the week more than 280 A3-sized colour and black-and-white photographs from this year as well as 2009 and 2010 will be on display, accompanied by projected images and recorded interviews with the participants.
Images include pictures of women gagged with black tape, representing the isolation and silence that rape victims are subjected to, also men and women wearing T-shirts with anti-gender-violence messages, and naked women bearing similar messages painted on their bodies, illustrating how they are taking back their power over themselves.
For the past five years Rhodes University, together with the 1in9 Campaign, has highlighted the fact that rape is often not reported because of the stigma it holds for many survivors, and the unsuccessful prosecution of rape and violence perpetrators. Participating students show their support for these demonstrations every year, in an attempt to support women who speak out against sexual violence.
"This exhibition challenges the ideology that patriarchy is pervasive and simply deemed the natural order," says Larissa Klazinga, the Student Services Officer in the Dean of students division. The exhibition is part of the Sexual Violence=Silence protest that takes place in the second term of every year; a growing campaign that Klazinga described as significant because of the encouragement it gives to people to speak out about sexual violence.
