Nadya Mitskevitch

Statistics say that during the quarantine period, the number of cases of domestic violence increased in many countries.

Since 2019, I have taken up the topic of domestic violence in my work. Based on my little experience in the past, collecting different stories, in Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Europe, I began to develop this theme through art.

And at the beginning of 2020, we all ended up in quarantine. Statistics say that during the quarantine period, the number of cases of domestic violence increased in many countries. And finding myself at home, in a studio, locked up, I began to draw works, working on the theme of violence. I looked for the material in Internet, looked for real cases, read a lot and talked with friends in different countries through a Zoom.

How can you endure so much time at home? How can you be with someone 24/7 and not go crazy? And what if that someone hits you? Can a normal relationship pass this test? How can you survive locked up with an abuser? What if a partner humiliates and beats a partner who has nowhere to run?!

All these questions I asked myself while working on this series of works. And I continue to work now.

“Assembly of New Martyrs” – here are women who suffer for faith in the Family. These are the “new martyrs” – real women illustrating real cases. The composition is repeating the Orthodox iconography canon “Assembly of All Saints”) They stand in 12 rows, symbolizing the year – but in fact, according to statistics, there are much more cases of domestic violence in a year. They appear in front of us with their injuries, as one big picture of the fact that we do not know what is happening behind our backs, behind closed doors.

“Call for Help” – is a work dedicated to the topic of domestic violence. Women living in abusive relationships, more often than not, do not know how to get out of them, how to run away, where to go. And when these women find themselves locked at home with the aggressor, according to the law and quarantine rules, they do not imagine a way out of the situation at all. These women are victims of domestic violence – with traumas, fresh or healing wounds, with or without children, desperate, suffering. They call and ask for help in one video chat – a new symbol of the connection of our time. Which call will you answer?