Yesterday Somali judge Sheikh Mohamed Abdi Aware was assassinated by masked assholes outside of a mosque in Bosasso, a well-known human trafficking route. Aware sentenced hundreds of human traffickers and pirates to prison throughout his lifetime. This is the same day I went to Washington Square Park to check out the Helen Bamber Foundation’s touring installation Journey, which is seven shipping containers designed by separate artists intended to evoke the emotional stages a trafficked woman experiences. I’m a guy, but I think it worked.
A hell of a lot of ladies fall victim to sex traffickers each year. It’s difficult to pinpoint the actual number of annual peddles because the data varies widely depending on who you ask. UNIFEM (The United Nations Development Fund for Women) says the number is anywhere from 500,000 to 2 million, while the United States State Department has the comparatively conservative estimate for the total number of traffic victims (men and women) at 600,000 to 820,000. Doesn’t matter who’s actually right—even one is fucking sad.
Journey aims to put the viewer in the shoes of Elena Varga, a trafficked woman from Moldavia. Each part made me feel pretty terrible for her and everyone else who’s gone through this, but none gave me the urge to jump in a vat of Clorox faster than the container labeled “bedroom.” Designed by Sam Roddick, it smells like stale sex and hemorrhoids. The room is cheerfully decorated with “used” condoms, toilet paper, an oval mirror with “men per day” scrawled across it in red lipstick, and a bed soiled with what looks like dirt, shit, and blood. Taking photos in there gave me the same feelings of desperation, hopelessness, and the urgent need for escape I get when I find myself in a heavily trafficked Porta-John. Recognizing that that container represents someone’s actual reality is difficult to swallow.
Photographer James Oster’s portion of the exhibit lines the walls with un-edited pictures of him in various stages of decency. Since sex trafficking doesn’t only happen where there’s no such thing as running water, Oster visited six brothels in three UK cities. Once alone in the room with prostitutes, after paying for services, he asked them to take pictures of him in any way they pleased.
The women instructed him how to pose, when (if at all) to take his clothes off, and when the photo session ended. He recorded their instructions and wrote them above each of the photos. None of the prostitutes knew the pictures would be displayed in an exhibition.
If you feel like being reminded why your life is good, the installation is not to be missed. It’ll be in Washington Square Park until this Sunday, November 15th, before it heads to Madrid for another leg of its tour.
Tags: Journey, kind of a bummer, Photography, sex trafficking, Sheikh Mohamed Abdi Aware, Washington Square Park
i am getting chills looking at this shit.
i’d O.D. and die if I ever got kidnapped into one of these places
holy
fucking
shit
the hairs on the back of my neck are standing on end…
I actually agree. This is FUCKED! Good work.
Wouldn’t miss something as classy as this.
i kind of want to see this but i’m scared it will give me some seriously fucked up nightmares.
hahaha hipster nightmares. what are those, the local corner store is out of camel wides? get a clue. you are the new yuppies. you would o.d. and die? what a fashionable way to go… try getting a job instead, fool.
Washington Square Park…. Philadelphia?
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Is that number counting all the slaves working for the US Government and Obamamaster? LOL! Pathetic!
That, juxtaposed with the photos, is one hell of a mix.