What Were You Wearing?
February 1-29, 2020
Artist Reception: Friday, February 7, 2020 from 5-7 p.m
Opening Reception |
Opening Reception Visitors |
Hayden explains DSVS programs |
Students look at What Were You Wearing Survivor Installation |
The What Were You Wearing? Survivor Art Installation was developed in 2013 by Jen Brockman and Dr. Mary Wyandt-Hiebert and shown in 2014 at the University of Arkansas. It was a project inspired by the poem, “What I Was Wearing” written by Dr. Mary Simmerling. Dr. Wyandt-Hiebert and Ms. Brockman had worked as sexual violence and intimate partner violence survivor advocates for over a decade when the Installation was created. The poem “What I Was Wearing” inspired this Installation, but it did not give voice to the “what were you wearing?” question. This myth is one of many pervasive narratives utilized to blame survivors and justify perpetrators.
The stories utilized for the project were donated by survivors and are used with their consent. Clothing in the Installation is not the actual clothing worn by the survivor; they are recreations of the stories that were donated. The goal of the Installation is for participants to see themselves reflected in not only the outfits, but also the stories. This realization moves us away from blaming the victim for violence and places responsibility where it belongs, on those who caused harm.
It is the hope that survivors who experience the Installations feel heard, validated, believed, and know that the assault was not their fault. Although it has been displayed on multiple campuses in the Midwest since 2013, the Installation gained notoriety in 2017 at the University of Kansas, in Lawrence. A Lawrence Journal World article by Sarah Shepard led to viral media coverage and requests to host the Installation from over 50 countries on five continents.
