Vicious cycle. The NeUyat exhibition in Tashkent highlighted how violence begets more violence.

The event is being held for the third consecutive year by the anti-violence project Nemolchi.uz. This year, it opened on November 2. The exhibition features installations created by contemporary artists and activists who aim to draw attention to the issue of violence and its long-term consequences. Each exhibit tells a story embodied in an art format.

"The idea for the exhibition emerged in 2022 as an expansion of the media narrative through art. While the initial focus was on sexual violence, this year the theme has broadened to encompass a wider range of issues related to gender violence against women and girls," noted the curator of the exhibition and volunteer at Nemolchi.uz, Nigina Khudaibergenova.

One of the central exhibits is titled "The Last Day of Childhood." It recreates the room of a teenager whose life has been shattered by trauma. The installation symbolizes the moment when childhood ends, and the world becomes dangerous and unpredictable. It serves as a metaphor for the fact that after experiencing horrors, one cannot return to a state of safety and carefree youth.

The next exhibit is "Places Not on the Map." Here, visitors can mark on a city map the locations where they encountered harassment, assault, or violence.

This work reveals the scale of the problem of sexual violence in urban environments, prompting viewers to realize how often violence occurs in the most ordinary places – on the streets, in buses, and in educational institutions. It creates a space for reflection on how the city we live in can sometimes become dangerous.

The exhibition also featured an installation dedicated to femicide in Uzbekistan. It consists of 179 textile dolls representing women, each symbolizing a victim of violence. This is the number of cases of murdered women and girls recorded in 2021 in the republic, according to UNFPA data.

A similar installation is titled "Invisible Numbers." This art object made of transparent sheets with red bars illustrates the statistics on femicide in Uzbekistan from 2015 to 2021.

Note. Femicide is the intentional killing of women based on their gender.

The object "Violence Breeds Violence" depicts a temporal loop in which a victim of violence becomes trapped. After experiencing it and not processing their trauma, a person is doomed to return to it over and over again.

Trauma is not forgotten: it sinks into the subconscious, and a person unknowingly lives with it throughout their life, getting stuck in this state. Often, this can lead to the victim of violence becoming an aggressor themselves, justifying what has happened to them. Thus, the creators pose the question: can the cycle be broken and one escape the loop?

NeUyat is not just an exhibition but a significant step towards creating a safe and dignified society for women. The organizers and participants of the exhibition invite society to ask questions that are not always easy to answer but are essential to discuss. As Nigina Khudaibergenova notes, the project aims to dismantle the culture of shame surrounding survivors of violence: "It is not shameful to be a survivor of violence; it is shameful to be the one who commits it."

Every year, an open call is announced for the organization of the exhibition, accessible to all who wish to participate, regardless of their experience or readiness to work.

"We strive for diversity in mediums: photography, video art, painting, installations," the curator explained.

She mentioned that workshops are held for participants to ethically process the theme of violence and create works that are then united into a common narrative. Additionally, the organizers cover the costs of creating the works and provide fees, which remains a rare practice in Central Asia.

"We want the contributions of female artists to be recognized and valued," emphasized Nigina.

The exhibition is taking place at the 139 Documentary Center in the capital from Tuesday to Sunday. It will be open until December 14.

In the future, the team plans to make the project mobile so that residents in other regions can also experience the exhibition.