Our Bodies Remember opens November 8th at Awakenings, a non-profit organization making visible the artistic expression of survivors of sexual violence. The exhibition features six artists grappling with the adversity of existing in their bodies, when others have inflicted emotional, physical, and psychological pain, taking illicit ownership of their autonomy. Featuring a wide range of media and materials, the artists find commonality in their devotion to create work that evokes a visceral response. Through their work, they demonstrate the complexity, the fragility, and the synonymous nature of the body. At Our Bodies Remember, one can find works featuring internal bodily mechanisms and organs, the body interacting in various spaces, and the vandalized body, just to name a few. Through Our Bodies Remember these survivors embark on their individual artistic journey to heal and reclaim what is rightfully theirs, their body.

With: Bobbie Groth, Danielle Aviva, Darcy Scanlon Moulton, Kristen Niccolò, Rachel Corbin, and Rachel L

Inspired by historical events and figures, Bobbie Groth’s paintings and sculptures highlight the inequalities women and people of color continue to be subjected to every day. Groth’s work through color and line explore bodily autonomy and safety compromised at the hands of those wrongfully empowered.

Through her paintings, Danielle Aviva documents what it means to be a survivor healing from sexual abuse. Focusing on the body in specific spaces, Aviva expresses the importance of feeling safe in one’s environment when healing from trauma.

Darcy Scanlon Moulton’s series “Resultant of Tragedy to the Human Heart”, confronts the effects of sexual violence, battling to stay loving, trusting, open, and soft in the face of life’s most traumatic events. Through her realistic painting of a human heart, Moulton takes back ownership of her body from the inside out.

Kristen Niccolò Lafferty brings attention to the harsh reality of living in a body after it has been subjected to “vandalism” at the hands of another. She expresses this vandalism through photography, mixed media work, and writing, finding closure in artistic expression.

Documenting the anxiety, depression, and dissociation many survivors experience, Rachel Corbin heals from the sexual abuse she experienced as a child. She shares her story through painting, drawing, and mixed media work, hoping to reach other survivors through her art.

Interested in the nonlinear nature of rocks and their narrative capabilities, Rachel L. utilizes rocks to express her own experiences as a survivor of sexual violence. She presents her memories of trauma through photography and by inviting viewers to not only look at her work but also to play and rearrange the rocks she has presented.

Official Website

More events on this date

Tags: Awakenings, Bobbie Groth, Chicago, Danielle Aviva, Darcy Scanlon Moulton, Kristen Niccolò, Our Bodies Remember, Rachel Corbin, Rachel L, Ravenswood