U’Sandık: Visual Diary Against Femicide

U’Sandık: Visual Diary Against Femicide” (instagram/u__sandik) was created in order not to forget the women we lost due to femicides. 

The project of U’Sandık started on July 1, 2021 when Turkey withdrew from the Istanbul Convention. U’Sandık; so that the people in charge who do not do their duty to prevent femicides, or enforce the laws efficiently, and yet, withdraw from the Convention despite the circumstances where femicides are committed every day, look in this mirror; and so that no man who murdered a woman can say, “It is good that Turkey withdrew from the Istanbul Convention”.

Women whose purse had “a restraining order” or a note that says “Will you protect me when I’m dead?”… Women who were murdered because they wanted to separate or filed for divorce, or they gave the neighbour a pot, or girls, because they didn’t want to get married when they were 12… Some get murdered even though they complained at the police station saying “He’s going to kill me”, while others get murdered despite having a restraining order. Their deaths make the headlines saying “another femicide” with just a few lines; news articles having such little information about them, and sometimes not even mentioning their names. U’Sandık; so that their deaths are not ignored, normalized or forgotten, and their memories live on.

We have been able to follow the femicides as much as they made the news as “another femicide”, and we could collect their biographies as much as we could. When we could not find their photographs, we pictured them in our imagination. U’Sandık; so that they leave their marks in our collective memory, and their memories continue to live.

U’Sandık; so that women’s lives do not end by the hands of or the neglect of men-state-politics-jurisdiction; so that it is a mirror to those who cause these deaths, and who condone them!

U’Sandık is produced by Filmmor – U’Sandık Collective. In the project of U’sandık, cards are being made, including life stories and original portrait drawings for each woman we lost due to femicides as far as they could fit in a frame, and unfortunately, they are quickly piling up.

U’Sandık will then turn into a digital museum. Info cards of women murdered since July 1, 2021, have begun to be posted on instagram/u__sandık. U’Sandık Collective will continue to make an effort so as not to forget the women we lost due to femicide and not to let them be forgotten. Hoping not to add another card every day and close the U’Sandık as soon as possible…

#USandık #FemicideisPreventable