The Woman Warped
CONTENT WARNING: This artwork contains or explores content that touches on any of the following topics: abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, verbal); aspects of psychology and mental health and contains depictions of self-harm, substance abuse, eating disorders, or suicide; swears or curses; hurtful or hateful language; discrimination (race, color, national origin, religion, sex, gender identity, pregnancy, disability, sexual orientation); aspects of pregnancy; blood, violence, assault, kidnapping, trauma, or dying. Please read or view with care.
Zhalet B.
Chalk Pastel
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The ‘Warped Woman’ in this drawing is me. To be warped means to be distorted, to be changed from one’s normal way. As a person, but especially a woman, I am warped in many ways. When I was thirteen, I developed an eating disorder. It ravaged my life, my body, and my relationships. When I looked in a mirror, I would ache with the shame of having flesh. My body became unknown to myself—I was my own stranger. Now, years later, the girl in those photos is just as strange, but the woman I see in the mirror is not. It is in part because of this disconnection from myself that I explore and exhibit my body through art. As I drew her this time, seated at an easel in my school’s art classroom, I observed the people viewing me. Some were shocked, intrigued, aroused—all emotions that have been aimed at me over the years. There is no escape from being watched, so I purposely laid myself bare. I dare to trust myself, as I did with this piece, to create through my intuition. Some think I dare to be vulgar, but I disagree. Here, I may be doing any number of things, and most of them come with social stigma attached. Self-pleasure, shaving… I am at my most vulnerable and my most powerful. In a world that continues to create shame around women’s bodies, minds, and creations, I hope my artwork stands in defiance of this.
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Creativity is the freedom to express oneself through art.
