Amazing Resilience honours survivors of child abuse, and their amazing resilience of the human spirit. This piece is based on my own experience. While I was being abused, I saw myself older and taller, as an adult, calling to me, helping me cope. A photograph of this artwork featured on the leaflet for the […]
Category: Art
Blue Ribbons of Support
I have these ribbons at my exhibitions, on which people can write messages as a sign of support for survivors and victims of abuse. Offering words of public validation and a social response that we are not alone, we have nothing to be ashamed of and we are not worthless. Here are a few things […]
Battlelines
Down there she is losing the battle the battle she was supposed to lose the battle rules were set before she arrived here Their game their rules their pleasure her downfall up here I win I want to stay up here stay away from her I want to win and here I do
Going Inside My Battenberg Cake
In order to forget the abuse, I created another world into which I could put my mind whilst my body was being abused. A door opened in my head. The cartoon girl is floating and disappearing in a tower made from Battenberg cake. This well known technique is called ‘Dissociation’ and it has been used by survivors […]
The Defeated
The sculptures bodies suggest a surrender, a frozen stance to show how the process of abuse is one of humiliation where the children are forced to abandon themselves in order to survive these ordeals. The children learn to disconnect as they lose trust in themselves. All these sculptures have moveable armature and can be placed in […]
Alphabet Un-formed
O A pile of letters shows the alphabet unformed, some are half formed words. The words are separate from the body, showing that slowly, the words came- whole words I found years on. Dr David Lasak, who studies the neurobiology of trauma, explains how during trauma, the experiences are encoded in non-verbal pathways of […]
Skin Talks
Skin Talks are large pieces of pink rubber that symbolise skin. The words show the imprint of trauma resides in my flesh. ‘SKIN-TALK’ WORDS … IMPRINT The feelings got mixed in with the bruises the hate got transferred onto me the imprint now visible on my skin I can see it UP AND BEYOND It […]
THE INVISIBLE STATE
A group of survivors of a peadophile ring that is forgotten, who are bound together not as individuals but as one identity. They represent a powerlessness and a state of invisibility that comes from the the impact of abuse and the experience of being disbelieved and blamed.