The Intention: To raise awareness and amplify the stories of survivors of U.S. child-marriage, in order to impact legislative change.
The doors represent how the dark secrets of abuse can often lurks behind idyllic-looking closed doors, especially in child marriages.
The Doors
I created a series of 10 doors with embroidery panels behind each one. The embroideries feature actual quotes from survivors of child marriages as well as statistical quotes from articles on the topic. Below you can view the individual doors and embark on the storytelling journey the embroideries tell.
*note, the survivor's names have been changed at their request to protect their privacy. source: unchainedatlast.org
Below: Behind Closed Doors installation at the HR Block Artspace, as part of the 2022 exhibition, Landscapes of Intimacy.
Postcards to Legislators
Below: to accompany the doors exhibit, I provided pre-written postcards addressed to the state legislators, asking them to make changes to the state laws to prohibit child marriage. 250 postcards were sent as a result of both exhibits.
Subversive Family Shelves Installation
I created a second exhibit, using the idea of behind closed doors, but thinking of how I could represent the problem using a space that resembles a family shelf wall inside a home. Below is an interactive clickable photo of the installation. Click on an item on the shelves to see an enlarged photo and details about the object's meaning.
Interact with the below scene by clicking on the <-- / --> arrows in the top right corner.
Below: an enlarged still of the shelf wall exhibit. Click here to view the individual object photos and descriptions.
Awards and Recognitions
For this work, I received an American Graphic Design Award in 2022 from GDUSA for their annual awards in the Designing For Good Category. This work also placed as a finalist for AIGA Baltimore's 2022 FLUX design competition. Artspace in KC, which hosted the original exhibit of this work, gave it an honorable mention -- the first of its kind for a graphic design artist in KCAI's annual BFA exhibition.