Blog Post #2: "A half-century before the hashtag, artists were on the front lines of #MeToo"

   In an article written for The Conversation, Vivien Fryd argues that since the 1970s, long before the start of the #METOO movement, artists have been bringing attention to the issue of rape and sexual assault in art. Fryd goes on to describe the way in which Renaissance era paintings depicting both Greek and Roman mythological figures which glamourized the action of rape, presenting it in an almost heroic light. She goes on to discuss the works of Suzanne Lacy and Leslie Labowitz, as they were at the forefront of the movement to create a visual counternarrative and raise awareness about sexual trauma in the modern world. They created seven complex works of performance art in Los Angeles to recontextualize rape in the public eye and bring awareness to the violence of the act. One Fryd decides to focus on is Three Weeks in May (1977), wherein Lacy would stencil in the word "RAPE" in bright red over a municipal map of the city over places where woman had been raped over a three week period. The map was located the City Mall Plaza, and she would update the map daily. On a second map, she would label places where rape survivors could receive help. The work, along with the rest of its collection, would gain media attention, furthering its reach. Following that, more artists would join Lacy and Labowitz in creating art to show the violence and cruelty of rape, many of which were based off recent events at the time. Lacy and Labowitz would perform and updated version of Three Weeks in May, in 2012 with Three Weeks in January, installed outside the LAPD's Deaton Auditorium, and while the numbers had certainly decreased, it was clear that sexual assault was still a problem in the city. All of this occurring before the start of #METOO, planting the seeds that would grow into the future movement.

Three Weeks in May

    It sickens me just how long this has gone on for, how many years we have had to shout just to be barely heard. That rape had to be unromanticized. How something so awful could ever be portrayed as something godsent, something lucky, something beautiful. How the suffering of human life could be so widely ignored until it was right in their faces in bold red font. That for nearly 50 years, half a century, people have been speaking up, and only in the past 5 has even a fraction of social, mainstream awareness begun to flourish. 

       I should not have to feel afraid to live in a city. I should not have to feel as if I need to bring something that could be used as a weapon with me whenever I want to leave my apartment. I should not have to fear going out at night on a school campus. I should not have to be afraid of my own partner, or made to feel as if I am obligated to do something I don't want to do to make them happy.

    And most of all, I should not have to be afraid that I will not be believed when I tell those close to me that something horrible has happened to me.

   Woman Walks into Bar – Is Raped by Four Men on the Pool Table – While 20 Watch

by Sue Coe

    “It stops now,” said Judge Rosemary Aquilina, “Speak out like these survivors, become part of the army.”

    Shout it, if you must, in any way you can.

Source: 

Fryd, Vivien G. “A Half-Century before the Hashtag, Artists Were on the Front Lines of #metoo.” The Conversation, September 13, 2022. https://theconversation.com/a-half-century-before-the-hashtag-artists-were-on-the-front-lines-of-metoo-113012.