it goes on – and on – and on

2001–2014 | Work in progress | Multiple-edition calendar cards | Doormat

I started this work in progress in 2001 and have adapted it in the meantime to each new exhibition venue, also by regularly updating the age of the girl mentioned in the text.

The give-away multiples – like the calendars often used by banks and other firms for their year-round advertising – bear a simple inscription that sticks in the mind, for example, in 2011: “The 12-year-old girl is still choking on her father’s dick”.

Either as a doormat or on the risers of a stair, calendar cards go on display at each venue for the duration of the exhibition, to remind every visitor of how easily people continue on their way while ignoring the issue of sexual violence.

In this way, I highlight the everyday lack of public acknowledgement of, and response to, this crime. It also illustrates what this means for the girls* and boys* exposed to sexual assault. They are left all alone, stuck for years or even decades in their hopeless situations, with no way out. Caregivers, family and other people around them, their school and society in general rarely give them a chance to speak out and break free.

The primary statement here, as in many of my works, is: To end sexual violence, we have to confront it, day in, day out, and take concrete action.