Vocing Desires

Public Project, Writting, 2023

After online communication with the editor of "Rural Women" magazine and an offline meeting with the founder of the women's public welfare organization "The Green Rose," I learned that we share a common interest in the creative works, mutual aid, and mental health of rural women.

Based on this, with the help of their existing resources, I launched a public art project called "Voicing Desires." This project involved organizing anonymous submissions of erotic fiction, prose, poetry, and other literary forms to provide a platform for rural women to engage in writing about their desires. This writing mode challenges the classism, officialdom, and educational mainstreaming artificially imposed on contemporary art. This activist approach provided an effective opportunity and pathway for women from marginalized groups of different cultural backgrounds and educational levels to make their voices heard.

We received a total of 716 letters from women of different educational levels, regions, ages, and professions. The project also facilitated 66 individuals to make separate letter or phone contacts with each other. This public project provided an outlet for the participating rural women to communicate and express their desires and selves, an outlet that does not rely on men, where they can vent and satisfy themselves. It enabled these rural women to move beyond the roles of the silent and the written about, to voice their own stories. The entry of women as subjects into the text marks the beginning of women reclaiming their discourse power.

Based on some contributors' concerns about the privacy of their letters and written content, after confirming with them that there were no intentions to retain or publish these materials, I personally burned these letters and preserved the ashes. This act, while protecting their individual privacy, symbolizes to me the traces of their act of voicing their desires. It signifies that their actions were not meaningless or unnoticed.

Vocing Desires