The Sky Is Mine
No Matter Where I AM
2014
Begovich Gallery, California StateUniverity of Fullerton, CA.
An exhibition featuring twenty-two national and international artists who are giving a voice to society’s homeless. Using a variety of mediums including video, print, installation, and sculpture the participating artists have created works that narrate, document and advocate for the lives of those living on the margins of society. A goal of the exhibition is to highlight social activism and cooperation as a means to open discourse on the topic of homelessness bringing attention/awareness to the need for social change.
Neda Moridpour's interactive video installation Explores the fact that Domestic Violence is a leading cause of homelessness for women and their children. Many victims face homelessness when they flee abusive homes. Their experiences are confounded by economic instability, often perpetuated by abusers.
Moridpour's goal was to create awareness about these facts, which are often ignored in the society. To do this, she created a space filled with cardboards, along with a video of the sky projected onto the ceiling, which referred to the environment that one of the survivors was living in for many years of her life. The audience could listen to the survivor's strong story via headsets while interacting with the piece by shedding light on the words that were hand written on gallery's dark walls.
Some of the hand written texts on the walls included:
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Between 22% and 57% of all homeless women, report that domestic violence was the immediate cause of their homelessness.
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38% of all victims of domestic violence become homeless at some point in their lives. A victim of domestic violence will often leave an abuser multiple times before finally escaping the violence, therefore, experiencing multiple periods of homelessness.
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Over 90% of homeless women have experienced severe physical or sexual abuse at some point in their lives, and 63% have been victims of intimate partner violence as adults.
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In a 2006 report by the U. S. Conference of Mayors, 44% of the cities surveyed identified domestic violence as the primary cause of homelessness.
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Abusers commonly sabotage a victim’s economic stability, making victims more vulnerable to homelessness. Many victims and survivors of domestic violence have trouble finding rental properties because they may have poor credit, rental, and employment histories as a result of their abuse.
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In 2005, Congress found almost 150 “documented eviction cases in the previous year where the tenant was evicted because of the domestic violence crimes committed against her,” and that nearly 100 persons were “denied housing because of their status as victims of domestic violence.”
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The average stay at an emergency homeless shelter is 60 days, while the average length of time it takes a homeless family to secure housing is 6-10 months.
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According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, for every 100 extremely low income (ELI) renter households, only 30 rental units are readily available and affordable.
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As long-term housing options become scarcer, victims are staying longer in emergency domestic violence shelters. As a result, shelters are frequently full and must turn families away.
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If emergency domestic violence shelters did not exist, the consequences for victims would be dire, including: “homelessness, serious losses including children [or] continued abuse or death.”
“The sky is blue for the same reason that the sunset is red. It does no harm to the romance of the sunset to know a little bit about it.” Carl Sagan
