T-SHIRTS laden with painful memories and messages of hope will feature in an installation as part of Mount Gambier’s 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence campaign.
The Main Corner will house the Clothesline Project, a domestic violence awareness exhibition that seeks to provide an opportunity for women to tell their stories through art.
Initiated in America in 1992, the project seeks to address the issue of domestic violence while providing a vehicle for women affected by violence to express their emotions by decorating a shirt.
The shirts are hung on a clothesline to be viewed by others as testimony to the problem of violence against women.
The global project symbolically begins on the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Woman and ends on International Human Rights Day.
Limestone Coast Family Violence Action Group chairperson Sonya Mezinec said the installation aimed to break silence around violence.
“When the initiative was started in the ’90s, it was a different time and a lot of people did not speak about domestic violence,” she said.
“Society has changed since then and many people are talking about the issue, but there still remains a lot of shame around domestic violence.
“This gives people an opportunity to have their say and make their voices heard.”
Ms Mezinic invited women who have experienced domestic violence, along with their families, friends and supporters, to decorate a t-shirt with words and pictures to describe their experiences.
“A few of my clients have been doing them and they are proving to be a really powerful thing to do,” Ms Mezinic said.
“They get so much out of doing it because they were able to write down what they thought of their experiences on their t-shirt.
“It is another way to highlight the issue a little bit differently and is a different tool to use for healing.”
The exhibition will be launched on November 28 at 1pm at the Main Corner by Mount Gambier Mayor Lynette Martin.
