>>11340791 (lb)
>Red Shoes at Dundee Uni?
For anons that want to dig more.
https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/this-artists-red-shoes-stand-in-for-all-the-women-lost-to-violence
Mar 10, 2020 6:35 PM EDT
Editor’s note: This story contains graphic details of violence.
Elina Chauvet’s red shoes are worldly. They’ve been in Milan, Italy, and Grand Rapids, Michigan. Not just one pair, but hundreds — red boots, red heels, red toddler shoes. They’re not there to see the sights, but to take up space. Especially when the women or girls who would have worn them no longer take up any space, except in the lives of their loved ones.
For more than a decade, Chauvet has staged her “Los Zapatos Rojos” installation in cities around the world. In January, the 60-year-old Mexican artist helped activists paint 300 shoes red and laid them out in pairs in an open, public place: inside Mexico City’s historic square. Some of the pairs — four of them — had once belonged to women who had been victims of gender-based deadly violence. To mark their absence, two mothers had personally painted and placed their daughters’ shoes inside the plaza.
For Chauvet, red takes on several meanings. It represents bloodshed, but also change and hope and love, according to the artist.
Wearing a luchador mask, artist Elina Chauvet (L) poses for a photo amid the hundreds of pairs of women’s red shoes inside Mexico City’s famous Zocalo plaza. The photo on the right shows Chauvet’s installation that was displayed on Grand Valley State University’s Pew Campus in March 2017. Photos courtesy of Elina ChauvetWearing a luchador mask, artist Elina Chauvet (L) poses for a photo amid the hundreds of pairs of women’s red shoes inside Mexico City’s famous Zocalo plaza. The photo on the right shows Chauvet’s installation that was displayed on Grand Valley State University’s Pew Campus in March 2017. Photos courtesy of Elina Chauvet
On Monday, nearly two months since Chauvet’s installation, Mexican activists launched a nationwide, 24-hour women’s strike, known as #UnDiaSinNosotras (A Day Without Us) on social media. There were fewer women and girls in work places, schools, the streets and other public spaces to demonstrate what it would be like if there were no women. Activists hoped the action will further pressure government officials into taking action against femicide in the country.
Mexico officially made “femicides” — the killings of women because of their gender — legally distinct from homicides in 2012. That change was meant to lead to tougher penalties and a greater support system for victims.
On average, 10 women and girls are killed each day in Mexico, according to an oft-cited statistic. That number has risen since 2016, when official government figures put the number at eight per day. But not all female murder victims are classified as femicide — that can differ in each country according to their specific legal definition.
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