Survivor-led Exhibition on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence

On 19 June 2019, the International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, the Mouvement des Survivant.e.s de Violences Sexuelles en RDC, organised an exhibition under the theme ‘Listen, Recognise, Join (us) the survivors’. The exhibition brought together artworks and performances by survivors and artists to document lived experiences of sexual violence and to challenge silence, stigma, and impunity.

The exhibition situated the experiences of survivors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo within a global context where sexual violence has long been used as a weapon of war. The DRC endured one of the deadliest conflicts since the Second World War, with millions killed and hundreds of thousands subjected to sexual violence since 1996.

The exhibition featured survivor-written texts and poems, photography collections documenting invisible conflicts and survivor resilience, paintings confronting silence and complicity, live performances (including poetry slam and an original choreography), and original installations created by the Movement.

Above are selected photographs from the collection showcased at the exhibition. The works were photographed by Platon and Cristina de Middel.