Yana Mazurkevich, an artist based in Belarus, has shared her new photography series with the world in order to shed light on victim-blaming in assault cases. The series, entitled ‘Dear Brock Turner,’ relates to the recent Stanford rape case in which 20-year-old Turner was charged with rape and sexual assault. The case received much attention after the victim’s powerful letter directed towards Turner circulated online.
Mazurkevich says it was the controversy surrounding the case which pushed her to do the project.
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Her photos are simple yet powerful, and have women holding placards with phrases that are all too familiar to those who’ve gone through a sexual assault.
‘You don’t know me, but you’ve been inside me, and that’s why we’re here today.’
‘It is deeply offensive that he would try and dilute rape with a suggestion of “promiscuity”. By definition rape is the absence of promiscuity, it is the absence of consent.’
‘I looked down and there was nothing. The thin piece of fabric, the only thing between my vagina and anything else, was missing and everything inside me was silenced.’
‘I wanted to take off my body like a jacket and leave it at the hospital with everything else.’
‘I was not only told that I was assaulted, I was told that because I couldn’t remember, I technically could not prove it was unwanted. And that distorted me, damaged me, almost broke me.’
The rape happened on January 2015. The victim, now 23, fought for over a year to get her case in court, only to have her assailant sentenced to a menial 6 months in county jail.
Mazurkevich hopes these photos will spread awareness that sexual assault, abuse, and rape victims shouldn’t be shamed and blamed.
