Outrageous Acts

Lotus Angel Warrior action figured amidst the flames and rubble of 9/11

In March, 2023, Shoshanah and poet Louise Paré, held an exhibition of paintings and poetry at Catalyst Ashland gallery confronting violence against women. The paintings, created between 2000 and 2009, had been shown only once before at a private viewing in 2011.

The history of women living under partriarchy is full of rapes, sexual assaults, mutilations, servitude, and denigration. Women have had to perform outrageous acts —rebellions, escapes, self-education including reading, political marches and campaigns, even murders in self defense—to preserve their sanity and sometimes their own lives and those of their children.

“One in four women will experience intimate partner violence in their lifetime, and of those 68% will suffer near-fatal strangulation at the hands of their partner.”
          —The Shelter for Abused Women & Children

Underwater Massacre - inspired by the film “Night of the Hunter”

Kali Rose - Hindu goddess of death and time and doomsday, also a symbol of motherly love, embodiment of creativity and fertility.

“…Kali, the destroyer, cannot be overthrown;/We must stay, open-eyed, in the terrible place…Help us to bring darkness into the light,/To live out the pain, the anger,/ Where it can be seen for what it is—/The balance wheel for our vulnerable, aching love.” —Mary Sarton, The Invocation to Kali”