Domestic violence can happen to anyone
From Snow White to The Simpsons, Italian artist aleXsandro Palombo has used these happy couples to highlight and bring attention to domestic violence.
These illustrations show a well loved couple with a twist, the iconic female characters will show the physical consequences of abuse. Like a bloodied lips or bruised eyes.
By using the iconic ‘happily ever after’ couples it really hits hard the reality of intimate partner violence, as well as making the viewer uncomfortable in a way that will force them to think about the issue.
There is a common misconception that domestic violence only happens to couples who are openly unhappy and argue frequently.
These images show that no matter how happy a couple seems to be this is something that can still affect them.
This campaign aims to bring domestic abuse into the limelight by forcing everyone to see and think about what happens behind closed doors.
By showing a husband lovingly place an arm around their battered wife, it shows an unsavoury reality of domestic abuse.
There are many cases where the abuser acts lovingly in public and in some cases would seem like the perfect partner, however behind closed doors everything would be completely different.
By using figures like Wonder Woman, who is the pinnacle of female strength as the subject of abuse also shows that domestic violence can happen to people despite their perceived strength.
By showing that it can happen to anyone, it dismantles the timid and passive stereotypes attached to survivors of domestic violence.
Palombo is no stranger to his eye opening campaigns with as he’s also challenged the idea of the perfect woman by featuring disney princesses with disabilities.
After a surgery to remove cancer, Palombo was left partially paralysed and because of this wanting to highlight the notion that beauty can come in different forms and wanted to breakdown the typical beauty stereotypes.
Women’s Aid defines Domestic Violence as: “An incident or pattern of incidents of controlling, coercive, threatening, degrading and violent behaviour, including sexual violence, by a partner or ex-partner.”
It is a huge issue and affects one in four women experiencing it in their lifetime, it’s also very dangerous as one in nine victims are being severely physically abused each year.
This is clearly not an issue that should be swept under the carpet. It is also something that could potentially be life threatening with two women being killed each week.
There is a 24 hour National Domestic Violence Freephone Helpline 0808 2000 247 which runs in partnership with Women’s Aid and Refuge.
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