Chantal’s project has helped other women understand it’s okay to speak up.
WARNING: Disturbing content.
ISABEL Flores was beaten to within an inch of her life. She suffered cuts and bruises, internal and external, after she was kicked and punched and choked for five hours straight by the one person she was supposed to be able to trust: her husband.
Her story is traumatic, but it’s one of a countless number of similar stories from victims of domestic abuse. The stories are normally told through tears and to only those the victim feels comfortable confiding in. But a new project — a photography catalogue by US artist Chantal Barlow — is opening up the conversation and shining a new light on the subject. What’s ugly has been made beautiful.
In lovely portraits women are smiling, bathed in warm light and positioned in front of a turquoise background. They’re not afraid anymore. They’re survivors who lived to talk about their struggle.
Ms Flores, whose husband is still free despite the torturous beating she suffered, knows talking about her suffering will help other women do the same. She hopes she convinces victims too afraid to get out of an abusive relationship that they have to run before it’s too late.
“If you don’t come out of the domestic violence, you come out dead,” she said. “You won’t survive. I lived that experience. My husband tried to kill me.”
Ms Flores described in graphic detail what happened to her the day her husband picked her up from the airport. She said immediately she knew something was wrong. He demanded a divorce. What happened next almost killed her.
Beautiful: Isabel Flores via Unconventional Apology.Source:Supplied
“In the midst of (talking about the divorce), it turned to where he thought that I was the one wanting the divorce, so it turned into anger from him because I didn’t react according to his expectations.”
She said his violence spiralled out of control. Instead of taking her home or discussing the issue rationally, he took her to a number of different hotels over a period of four days and told her family members she was “lost”.
He then drove her to an open field where she was convinced she would be left to die.
“I was sitting down, and he grabbed me and threw me out (of the car) and started kicking me and punching me. He had told me he was gonna kill me, my body feared. And when I saw the way he was doing that … kicking me and punching me like if he was fighting with a man, I realised that he was after killing me.”
She was left for dead in the fields without pants but survived. Police found her hours later.
The project Flores is a part of was started by Ms Barlow in 2014 as a way of paying tribute to a domestic violence survivor in her own family. She says her grandmother Mableine Nelson Barlow was shot dead by her husband, Chantal’s grandfather. Mableine’s favourite colour — turquoise — is a feature in every portrait.
The camera she uses to photograph the women was left to her by her grandfather. “The camera will be used as a tool to photograph other women who have been impacted by abuse and have been silenced,” she said.
Susan Hammoudeh. Via Unconventional ApologySource:Supplied
Susan Hammoudeh is one of them. Ms Hammoudeh said she met her abuser across a bar he worked in when she was 23. It started as love and unravelled quickly when his temper showed itself.
“So, some of the red flags that I saw that I chose to ignore were the yelling and the screaming. Not initially towards me, but like road rage, towards a neighbour, towards a roommate. Like, really aggressive yelling and screaming,” she said.
“Then it started to be directed towards me. And I was in such shock because no one has ever spoken to me in such a way, I mean the most derogatory names … everything from racist names … sexist … it was horrible.”
The name-calling led to fighting then threats then sexual abuse.
“The abuse turned sexual and it was primarily when he was intoxicated. He had an alcohol problem, a drug problem. So that was always the excuse.
“There was some physical abuse as well: rough housing, pushing me around, pulling my hair. And again, it was ‘I was drunk, I don’t remember any of it.’”
She said he raped her and at times she feared for her life. She left and so did Zoe La Placa, but not before her partner abused her, too.
Zoe La Placa spent nine years in an abusive relationship. Via Unconventional ApologySource:Supplied
“I was with this guy for 8-9 years. There has been bits and pieces that I’ve been able to talk about to those that are super close to me, but I don’t think I’ve ever fully sat down and just told the story, or my side of things because I’m sure he probably has his own idea of whatever. Just little things here and there, but I was just too embarrassed.”
She says her abuser was a “toxin” and she didn’t realise how “messed up” things had become in the pair’s relationship.
“He took my entire 20s and I don’t want to go in my 30s with him having power over my life.”
She met him when she was 20 and immediately he lied to her. He told her he was 27 but he was later revealed to be 31.
“I remember confronting him and just letting it slide,” she said.
She said she found it difficult to categorise her abuse but that its impact showed itself in different ways, the most harmful of which was that it taught her that violence was OK.
“I want to say that what I experienced was more so than anything, verbal and emotional abuse. I think that I was the one who, in many occasions, turned violent myself because of being attacked with words and manipulation and just overall cruel behaviour towards me, that I allowed myself to even attack him at times throughout the 9 years, which became something in my mind that was OK to ever do and was normal.”
In telling her story, she said she hoped to help others.
“If what I say here helps somebody else, there’s really nothing better than that.”
Read the powerful stories here.
If you or somebody you know needs help, phone 1800 RESPECT or visit lifeline.org.au.
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