Wild Women
In 2024 Sugar Stealers embarked on the journey of ‘Wild Women’, an evocative project using photography and art to challenge the traditional perceptions placed on women and garner freedom from the shackles of these expectations.
On Wednesday evenings we delivered free art classes where the women of our community would come to our community building, Fisher Gate Point, and work on a mask exploring their identity and creativity. These masks became a powerful personal statement for each of the women, expressing through art that which words could not.
At the end of the series of workshops, the wild women spent a day at a Sugar Stealers owned site in Trowel, where they explored the wilderness and immersed themselves in the natural landscape. Their day of discovery was captured through photographs taken by Emma Ford, depicting the women intertwined with nature, blending in with the trees and contorting themselves with the foliage. The masks that our women created took on a haunting yet symbolic essence, symbolising the beauty of women and the wildness they possess, a side of ourselves that we are often taught to hide.
As night fell, the women gathered around a bonfire, circling the flames in uninhibited movement, letting their bodies dance with true rawness and realness without fear of being judged.
Wild Women was commemorated with an exhibition that fittingly took place on March 8th - International Women's Day. From the first artistic workshop to the final photograph, it was a journey that needed to be shared. Friends, family and members of the public were invited down to soak in the magic that was captured in the forest that day - an unforgettable project of empowerment, self-expression and unfiltered creativity.
Thank you to Arts Council England for funding this project and making it all possible.
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