I exist... Open your Heart

"I EXIST"

A couple of weeks ago now after Rachel and I got talking about an idea I'd had to use face-paints and parts of the body photographed in the streets of Medina to explore expressions of being seen and heard:

I exist. Can you see me? Can you hear me? 

I exist.  Open your eyes. Listen to me. Speak for me.

I exist. See me. Hear me.  Love me. 

I exist. Open your heart.

In the context of our theme-of-the-month, Human Rights, this idea had developed from conversations about how a huge problem for many victims of abuse or neglect is not being seen or heard.   In going unnoticed or ignored victims are treated as if they have no value and are deprived of their voice, left to suffer long term in silence, without support of hope.

So we've been talking a lot about voice within the Meninadança Pink house over the last few weeks, designing our projects to offer the girls channels to voice their opinions and feelings, like their animation Familia Casa Rosa where the girls used their puppets to speak for them at the presentation in Medina's central Square on the 18th May.

Rachel and I had both been impressed by how the speakers in the square on the 18th focused on challenging the majority of ordinary people in the square to watch our for and denounce child sexual abuse and exploitation in Medina and to warn against staying quiet in witnessing violations.  I think in part Rachel and I hoped to use these images to explore ways of using the body to speak on behalf of the unseen and unheard to challenge viewers to consider what they may be ignoring in their community.  Who is it here in Medina that is suffering in silence?  Who is being ignored?  Who is not being seen? Who is not being heard?   

In hearing more and more from our Pink House director Rita, I am realising more and more how unseen our girls our in their communities and how the social risk they face is unnoticed or ignored.  So with these photos we began by thinking about the basic statement for each girl of: 

I exist, I am here. 

And in stating that "I am here" the girls are saying:

I matter. I have value.  

I deserve to be seen and heard.  I deserve to be cared for and protected.  

I deserve to be loved.

OPEN YOUR HEART

PHOTO SHOOT: 23rd May

Last Thursday was a 'dia feriada' here in Medina, a holiday day when almost every shop is shut and our girls were off school and the Pink House was closed for the day.  So Rachel and I grabbed the opportunity to set up the photo shoot and called our friend Nanielly Rodrigues, a local lass who's 18 years old and stunningly beautiful, to see if she was up for modelling for the project.  Happily Nani was free and up for it, and met us at the abandoned space Rachel and I had spotted on the weekend and been drawn to for its layer-upon-layer of history told by its crumbling walls.  Nani came along with 16-year-old friend Luana, another gorgeous local girl who was also up for modelling.  Both girls were brilliant models, patient, co-operative and daring, willing to allow even their eyelids and ear crevices to be painted! 

Nani and Luana were great company and we finished up the shoot with a tasty bowl of Brazilian special fruit dish acai to celebrate the exciting and successful day.  Muito obrigada meninas! :-)

"OPEN YOUR EYES"

Painting Nani's eyelids with eyes was an eerie experience, it felt like her eyes were open and she was staring at me as I painted, I even got spooked and dropped the paintbrush at one point!  The idea of this (perhaps in part inspired by Johnny Depp's eyes-on-eyes in Pirates of the Caribbean) was to illustrate how sometimes our eyes can be open but we are not seeing what is in front of us, we may as well have our eyes shut.  Nani and Luana drew the apt comparison with a doll's eyes, whose eyes are open but unseeing.

During the shoot and looking through photos afterwards I felt that these eyes looked too realistic, that the effect we'd aimed for was perhaps lost.   But interestingly, when we showed the images to the girls at the Pink House this week in one of the conversation circles this was one of their favourites.

Personally I feel that the strong black line across the lips is the strongest image for the demand "Speak for me", but in the same conversation circle the girls also chose the stitched lips as their preferred option.  Cristina and I wondered if this was because this reflects for them more strongly their personal experience of feeling unheard, that some of the girls really fell that their own mouths are stitched shut.  In the prayer circle immediately afterwards, before saying goodbye to go home, a few of the girls even taped their mouths shut with wide strips of masking tape.  Although done in a playful way it made me wonder about the deeper meaning for them.

Voice and Silence

(left) An image I created in my first week of being here with Meninadança, reflecting on the not having a voice and on the inverse, witnesses who do not voice. (Right) Postcard from the Museum of Memory in Santiago, Chile.

I originally thought the photos we took would be tests that we could develop into a workshop for the girls, using the photographs as examples to stimulate the girls to write slogans on their own bodies to express their feelings, thoughts and demands about being seen and heard.  However, over the course of the last week the photos have triggered a chain of events that have led to a far bigger project: "Dia Oito" as it is being referred to in passing at the Pink House, or "O Seu Olhar Pode Transformar Nossas Vidas" ("your look could transform our lives") our theme-of-the-week and now theme for all the events that will be presented on Saturday 8th June.  

Presenting our photos to Rita with the initial suggestion of a temporary street art exhibition of the girls art work, our conversation turned to the potential of a more permanent art intervention in the same abandoned space which led to the idea for a collaborative mural between myself and the girls.  Rita astonished me by getting permission for the mural from the local council the exact same afternoon as our initial conversation and since then through various meetings and brainstorming sessions this has led to an ambitious plan for a full evening of presentations of not only the girls art, but also their theatre, poetry and dance.  

I have been amazing and hugely impressed at how swiftly Rita has taken these initial ideas and developed them over this week with our staff team into a fully fledged plan, and with the help of numerous connections in the city set in motion all the technical, practical and security processes that need to be attended to (including the thorough preparation of the wall despite the two holiday days this week), through an amazing network of connections that leave me and the other volunteers agape - Rita is clearly so respected and loved here in Medina that we reckon she could be the town's mayor.

My biggest contribution to the event will be the mural collaboration which will be with the girls of the Pink House, and also a local mural artist Guina, who painted all of the dancers decorating the Pink House walls.  After brainstorming with our staff team at last Friday's weekly meeting and with a lot of helpful feedback and idea sharing with Rachel I came up with a design last weekend that allows for the girls images to be incorporated and focuses on representing peace and unity and collaboration in the community, and showing how that can lead to transformation of Medina's childrens' lives.  So a huge hope that I have for the mural is that youngsters from the different warring boroughs may come and paint with us, making not only the mural an image of peace and collaboration but potentially a living experience of it.  Let's see what happens, I have a lot of hope :-)

SOME OF MY FAVOURITE FINAL COLOUR IMAGES FROM THE PHOTO-SHOOT:

All these images are the work of amazing photographer and now great friend Rachel Alvarez.  See more of her work on her FB page here.  And keep an eye out on later posts for the black-and-white images that we chose as our final pieces.

 

"CAN YOU SEE ME?"

"OPEN YOUR EYES"

"HEAR ME" / "CAN YOU HEAR ME?"

"SPEAK FOR ME"

"SPEAK FOR ME"

"OPEN YOUR HEART"

Que linda dia de tinta e fotografia meninas, obrigada a todas tres por dividir um tempo tão produtivo e fantástico, me fica muito feliz com nossa realização! 
Abraços fortes.
:-)