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Student Narrative
GRAND PURCHASE PRIZE | $500 Menstrual pads as flippable pages of a book, this materiality tackles the ongoing social stigma of menstrual shaming and attempts to explore the definition of femininity as a whole. Is a part of womanhood just constant bleeding and cramping pain? The text embroidered are Nüshu女书 (directly translates to "women's script"), a writing system derived from Mandarin that is believably the only language system in the world that is strictly used among women. Only passed down from mothers to daughters, Nüshu, like periods, are similarly secretive. It was used as an underground channel to build female communities and commiserate over Chinese patriarchy. Written in this Nüshu is the school motto of the first ever no-tuition all-girls high school in China. The school takes in students whose education were often sacrificed when their families only send the boys to school. Layered with heavy Chinese cultural context, I aim to highlight such subversions to gender norms brought by both Nüshu and the all-girls school. They are resources only handed into women's hands, playing on the societal norm of male-only privileges and exclusivities and thereby reclaiming what was unfairly taken away from the female community. Presented like a present box, the empowering school motto is a gift to all girls who pick up this book. Others are also welcomed to look through the pages, and confront gender oppression by touching the taboo menstrual pads that are in blood-like colors and immerse in the experience of not-knowing, not-invited. "I was built to be a mountain not a creek" is the first line of the school motto poem.
Publication Date
12-1-2024
Description
GRAND PURCHASE PRIZE | $500 Purchase prize winners receive a cash reward and the books are added to the Fleet Library at RISD Special Collections' Artists' Book collection. Entry for the 11th Baker & Whitehill Student Artists' Book Contest. Opening reception and award ceremony Wednesday, February 19, 2025 at 6:30pm, Fleet Library, Main Reading Room. Juror: Roger S. Williams.
Keywords
artists' books; Baker & Whitehill
Disciplines
Book and Paper
Student Status
Undergraduate student
Year of Graduation
2029
Faculty / Course
Andrew Shea; EFS Studio Design
Materials + Techniques
Menstrual pads, embroidery floss, acrylic paint, collected objects, glue, ribbon
Photo Credit
Miles Tong 2025 FAV
Recommended Citation
Zhao, Cindy; Collections, Special; and Library, Fleet, "I Was Built to Be a Mountain Not a Creek" (2024). 11th Baker & Whitehill Student Artists' Book Contest 2025. 57.
https://digitalcommons.risd.edu/bookcontest11th2025/57
