Inscriptions of trauma series, 2025
Digital paintings
Diptych: (2) 122 cm x 69,5 cm
Artist’s Statement
Tshegofatso Ruth Papo’s artistic practice is rooted in her personal history, shaped by experiences of childhood sexual trauma, girlhood, and memory. These formative experiences guide her exploration of sexuality as both intimate and violent, tender and wounding.
At the centre of her artmaking process are stains—marks that resemble wounds and embody what the body remembers when words fail. Rooted in a core memory of the stain left on her underwear, these traces become visceral reminders of trauma. Through the deliberate staining of feminine hygiene products such as panties, tampons, and pads, Papo transforms intimate, everyday materials into metaphors for the wounded body of a girl—marked, vulnerable, and carrying the persistent residue of violation.
Her process often subjects these objects to acts of tearing and reshaping, violating their form to reflect the stripping away of innocence and the enduring scars of trauma. In this transformation, ordinary materials become charged sites where memory settles and silence is disrupted. This violation is also evident in her photographs, where she attempts to re‑capture the memory of violence. Yet, as she tries to remember, the images blur—revealing the instability of recollection, yet the body continues to remember. Through ethical collaboration with consenting participants, she creates spaces of ambiguity, care and reflection while engaging vulnerable narratives with dignity and respect.
Through this ongoing process, her work becomes an archive—not of fixed histories, but of bodies that remember.
Image Gallery
