Jamie Luoto at Kristin Hjellegjerde
Content warning: references to sexual violence, murder, and other gendered violence
It can be a cathartic experience to disassociate and allow art to feed your brain, to give you ideas with which to wrestle, or even to stop and wonder what the convoluted, abstract ideas are trying to tell you. In other times, the message is urgent: the jury is out about 'political' art, and how effective it is in terms of effectiveness (and of course this will vary with each respective artist), but how does overtly emotional artwork land? The kind of art that grabs you by the scruff of the neck and reminds you of individual and collective emergencies. If you can't think of an example of artwork that cries out in emotional pain, perhaps that is the point.
Women's suffering, and sexual violence in particular, is predominantly conveyed in the public domain through statistics, legal and policy campaigning, and sometimes Me Too-style testimonials that are made public in an effort to seek either social or legal justice. It is this framework of controlled anger that, while providing a use in some cases, can often lead back to the archaic notion of the hysterical woman. The anger is perceived as a flaw, rather than the cause.
So where are the women behind these statistics, these stories, these actions? To paraphrase the devastatingly powerful play, Prima Facie, starring Jodie Comer and written by Suzie Miller, we're talking about one in three women: "Look to your left, look to your right." At a time of forced autobiographical communications online, whereby we are increasingly encouraged to share our insecurities and traumas in the (somewhat hasty) name of de-stigmatisation, establishing the balance between finding support and community and preserving your privacy is necessary.
Enter: Jamie Luoto. At Kristin Hjellegjerde's London Bridge space, the San Francisco-based artist uses her own experiences in a frank and startling body of work, documenting the profoundly personal effects of sexual trauma. The aesthetics and the messaging come together perfectly, and the exhibition is both beautiful and challenging. This isn't to say that the artworks are so personal that their individuality isolates the viewer; indeed, many will surely find a degree of solace in this largely taboo topic being depicted so wholeheartedly and unreservedly through contemporary painting. The 'grief', to borrow an expression from the exhibition's title, is both collective and individual; after all, violence against individual women cannot be fought outside of the context of fighting violence against all women.
That being said, Luoto has purposefully positioned herself in her work through self-portraiture; we can see her weeping, cowering, hiding, contorting her body in fatigued despair. Her technical skill is photorealistic in many instances, and at points it is necessary to get close to the painting to fully appreciate that the artist's work is not photography. This is an ironic gesture given the ways in which the figures in the work fluctuate between meeting our gaze and hiding away.
We are informed that the paintings were "born out of what the artist describes as an intense moment of anguish and rupture". Were photography the medium of choice for this body of work, they would be immediate, with heightened emotion and rage pouring from the lens, and that is not to say that the rage is not palpable here, but of course painting is infinitely different to photography. Beside the technical skill, which is clearly long-established, the sheer amount of time and consideration required for painting, and sitting in the emotions of the work, allows a further meditation on the message and the process. The care and attention that has gone into these paintings do not go unnoticed.
Perhaps it is disingenuous to say that sexual violence (and subsequent trauma) is the 'taboo' it has previously been; we cannot underestimate the powers of relentless campaigning in the Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) sector, as well as the Me Too movement, among other examples. But as I mentioned previously, these issues are largely presented in facts, figures, statistics and policy statements. Its carceral aspect is also widely debated. In Luoto's work, there are several recurring motifs, but one that particularly stands out is sadness, which is a facet of sexual trauma that goes largely unaddressed. Fear, PTSD and rage are common tropes of what a woman might expect to experience after such an incident (or several), but the engulfing sadness is something that is unpalatable to various systems including the criminal justice system, as survivors are expected to communicate their experiences coherently and in a way that fits in with the Good Victim. An ability to express distress in a way that can convince a jury of strangers to validate their experience is a prized skillset. No wonder so few women report their abuser to the police.
Strange Woman, a stunning and devastating triptych painting in sombre dark tones with a bright white foreground to emphasise the importance of the bed, epitomises this sadness. The work surely belongs in a museum, to be surrounded by works that are in no way related to it, so the viewer can be shocked into this unbeknown witnessing of pure sadness and despair. The dark background is illuminated with condoms that far exceed the size of Luoto, crumpled in her bed. Menacing and nefarious, suddenly condoms are purveyors not of safety but of violence and threat and oversight; to be sure, a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Animals also play a similarly versatile role in these works. Strange Woman depicts cats, perhaps those belonging to the artist, keeping watch around her as she appears to emotionally disintegrate; mice also fidget and scurry around the bed. It is Tracey Emin's bed gone feral. Another dark and threatening work is The Swallowing, where the figure bends herself in half while cowering on the ground. Despite the theatre of rich red velvet curtains behind her, the body language is unambiguous; fear and despair once again run rampant through the painting. We share in the darkness with her; we are her. Shadows of wolves growling and barking emerge on the curtain, as the figure clutches a mask under her armpit, reminding the viewer of the necessary façade of the survivor. If it is one in three women, quotidian tasks can be rendered performance under PTSD.
It is also worth noting that these paintings are not small in scale; however much the artist might be retreating inside the canvas, she undoubtedly wants to make her message clear, manifest physically. The combination of the size with their realism is at times overwhelming, reminiscent of art that has taken the breaths of audiences for centuries. In works such as Alone Among the Fallen, I think of nineteenth-century (and earlier) artists depicting the Virgin Mary, artwork of whom embraces the chaste, sacred quietness of woman throughout the ages. Veiled for the greatest humility, inexpressive, silent; all the things women are supposed to be, regardless of their lived experience.
Earlier this year, I became fascinated with the media reporting around violence against women, and the sheer volume of news pertaining to this. I began compiling a Google Doc of the daily coverage of rape, murdered women, sexual assault and coercion. I got three days in before I gave up, wondering what I was trying to prove by keeping a record of everything I found. Women's faces were on the news constantly, and I found myself becoming increasingly neurotic with the repetition of it all. Of course, it needs to be reported on, but since when was the influx of VAWG in the daily news? To paraphrase Sara Ahmed, perhaps it's a case that once you notice it, you can't unsee its ubiquity.
These stories very rarely share the voice of the survivor (or victim, in the case of those who do not survive). The haunting spectre of voiceless women hung over me as I thought about the 1 in 3, the lack of justice (which is not to say criminal justice is the answer, but there is also not a tangible alternative for most people). We keep quiet until it is too much; we keep quiet until we physically and mentally break down and bear the additional stigmas of mental and physical illness; we keep quiet as we realise we haven't even told our closest friends; we keep quiet even while the trauma manifests itself elsewhere. This is where Luoto's work takes the reins, communicating her truth to a wider audience.
Shadows of Unseen Grief is not about revealing trauma to new, alien audiences, it is about the ways in which it manifests. Many people will find solace in this work, and those who cannot relate to its themes will be mesmerised in the skill and visual opulence on display. Sexual trauma and gendered violence are deeply entwined, and the exhibition leaves a profound impression on one microcosm of both.
After visiting Luoto's show, I revived my retired Google Doc, and did some desk research on the reporting of fatal gendered violence reported from 5 August to 5 October 2025, many of which are uxoricides. Please take care before clicking links, as many provide details that most will find distressing. Say their names: June Renteria, June Bunyan, Homeira Fazelmanesh, Lakshmi Kishandas, Fawziyah Javed, Shahla Karimiani, Anjanee Sandhir, Kimberly Lechner, Kristil Krug, Mrs. Stephen Dennis (unidentified), Nicola Cross, Niwunhellage Dona Nirodha Kalapni Niwunhella, Eser Karaca, Athena Georgopoulos, Carra Samantha Luke, Sheylla Cabrera, Emma Lovell, Nikki Cheng Saelee McCain, Geraldina Peguero-Mancebo, Tracey Davies, Larrica Gaines Smith, Anna Maria Murariu, Cheri Kommer, Keiona Wilson, Latricia Denise Brown, Lim Kimya, Mrs. David Armstrong (unidentified), Rashida Irvin, Valerie French Kilroy, Latricia Green Brown, Mrs. Seo Mo (unidentified), Wanda Taylor, Rocia Vega, Aliccia Grant, Dawn Searle, Patricia Watson-Geiger, Jenean Chapman, Ebony Owens, Ndata Bobb, Quitizia L. Holmes, Joan Cusson.
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