Island womxn
make good wives
Chapt. 2 inVulva Monologues
Photography
2023 - Ongoing
Womxn of Malta, we struggle to be humanised. Again and again, we are just a means to an end, objectified - vessel of reproduction, this is how our system views us.
How can we begin to understand, let alone improve our sexual reproductive health and rights under a system ruled by patriarchy? What is female sexual pleasure, dare I ask? Does it even come into account?
This project addresses the struggle of Maltese woman’s experiences with their sexual pleasure and the understanding of their own autonomy. This is done through exploring the aspects of catholicism and colonialism in their implications on the female body. Acknowledging the transgenerational sexual trauma of the community, this project investigates a shift towards a more hopeful future. In conversations with the artist, Maltese people assigned female at birth share their stories and their struggles to gain autonomy and sexual liberation.
How can we begin to understand, let alone improve our sexual reproductive health and rights under a system ruled by patriarchy? What is female sexual pleasure, dare I ask? Does it even come into account?
This project addresses the struggle of Maltese woman’s experiences with their sexual pleasure and the understanding of their own autonomy. This is done through exploring the aspects of catholicism and colonialism in their implications on the female body. Acknowledging the transgenerational sexual trauma of the community, this project investigates a shift towards a more hopeful future. In conversations with the artist, Maltese people assigned female at birth share their stories and their struggles to gain autonomy and sexual liberation.
There is a distinction between pain and suffering which Audrey Lourd carefully explains:
Suffering is the nightmare, the reliving of unmetabolized and unrecognised pain. Pain is an event, an experience that must be recognised, a force that can catalyse change, force knowledge or fuel action. We have been taught to endure suffering, to suppress our longings and to silence ourselves. But our pain slowly fuels a hopeful change that will liberate us towards our female right to body autonomy and agency.
Patriarchy is the ultimate leech, a venomous symptom running through our societal system, our motherland, Malta.
