We’ve all been there: crossing the street to avoid construction workers, turning up the volume on our headphones so we don’t hear random ‘compliments’ from creeps on the street etc. Basically, we are never not figuring out how to handle unwarranted attention every single time we leave the house.
Artist Elana Adler noted just some of the relatively innocent to the most gross comments she’s got on the street to create a series of cross-stitch and embroidery pieces entitled ‘You’re my duchess’.
The series is inspired by the hope chests that women put together in the old days as part of the dowry offered to men to prove their capabilities as a wife and mother – think quilt-making, cross-stitching and so on. Cross-stitching samplers were used to prove the women could read and write, as well as do embroidery. Might as well kill a few birds with that one sexist stone, we guess.
It's 'a contemporary feminist interpretation of women’s work and an objectification of my personal experience,’ Elana says. ‘Each captures a moment, giving these words a visual presence, a power, and a state of concreteness. These words were hurled casually and heard quickly but required hours of time-consuming, careful stitching.’
The collection is a dramatic contrast between the traditionally super-feminine craft of needlepoint and the vulgarity of catcalling, and while one unsolicited ‘compliment’ on the street might seem relatively harmless, a collection of 32 catcalls emphasises the level to which women deal with this daily harrassment.
‘Perhaps in the moment these statements are meant to compliment, but most don’t find vulgar, highly sexualised statements whispered or screamed at them by random strangers complimentary. Rather, they are an invasion of personal space,’ she says.
It’s really cool and you can check out the the whole series here
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.