Single-channel video projection, stands

The video installation Illustrating the Request for Privacy documents a performance developed by the artist Flo Kasearu together with a group of women from the women‘s shelter in the city of Pärnu. It addresses domestic violence against women, a social problem with devastating and severe consequences for society.

One in five women in Estonia has experienced physical violence and one in ten has been subjected to sexual violence. These are the official figures; the true figures are probably much higher. Kasearu‘ s interest in the issue is rooted in her own biography. In 2009, the artist‘s mother opened a women‘s shelter in the city of Pärnu. Through workshops and art projects over the years, Kasearu has engaged with several generations of women who live and are cared for at the shelter.

The artist met regularly with the group featured in Illustrating the Request for Privacy to experiment with artistic coping strategies. This led to the idea for the performance, and Kasearu organised a show with the women‘s group at the NO99 Theatre in Tallinn as part of Artishok Biennial, which was then documented on film. The women sat with the audience in a courtroom-like architecture, reading passages from the files of their own court cases for several hours.

Shot in black and white, Illustrating the Request for Privacy focuses on the act of reading aloud by the different women, highlighting the artificial bureaucratic language of the court documents, which seems completely detached from the traumatic events and, in its abstraction, inflicts further violence on another level. While the spectators witness the courageous act of emancipation of these women, the work simultaneously illustrates the disparity between the legal proceedings and records and the personal traumatic experiences that the victims are left alone with.

• Sektion Section: Exhibition
• Programm Programme: Witnessing Witnessing