Stamp Gallery Exhibition Showcases Work of Sexual Violence Survivors

The Stamp Gallery will present “We Will Not Be Silent: Art Transforming Rape Culture,” featuring four artists who form a network of survivors and supporters addressing sexual violence, Oct. 30-Dec. 15.

Their sensorial works, made from makeup, salt, clay, wood, fabric and their own bodies, invite viewers to feel the realities of surviving and confront the links between sexual violence and the institutions that create it.

The artists are: Gloria Garrett, known as the “Mother of Makeup Art,” from Baltimore, who transformed everyday cosmetics into vivid, joyful works of art; Nickole Keith, a citizen of the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of the Potawatomi Tribe, who shapes and centers her art around historical atrocities from her Indigenous heritage; Eva Salazar, who combines improvisation and performance with physical materials such as ceramics, painting and textiles; and Jadelynn St Dre, a queer, disabled and Latine artist who blends performance, ritual, somatic movement and experimental poetry.

Each artwork will be displayed alongside the artists’ contributions to the Monument Quilt, a collective project comprised of 3,000 stories from survivors of sexual violence, emblazoned on fabric and displayed in public places. In the spirit of the now concluded Monument Quilt, a series of banners made by UMD students will be on view.

The exhibition is curated by UMD American studies doctoral student Hannah Brancato, an artist, educator and co-founder of FORCE: Upsetting Rape Culture, an art/organizing collective active from 2010-20. Curatorial Assistants are Rachel Schmid-James and Gabriella “G” Warner.

It is supported by a Do Good Institute Campus Fund Grant, Arts For All and the Maryland State Arts Council. Programming is supported by the LGBTQ+ Equity Center, the Student Experience and Disability Culture Initiative and CARE to Stop Violence.

An opening reception will be held 5-7:30 p.m. Nov. 5. The exhibition is open to the public; the gallery is open 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Monday–Thursday, 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Friday and 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday.