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Mahurangi women are invited to become part of feminist art history by covering their torso with golden clay and posing anonymously for the Every Body is a Treasure exhibition.
Master photographer Mandi Lynn is bringing her award-winning Girl Power Series workshops to Warkworth’s Old Masonic Hall on Saturday, August 17.
“Women of all ages have found it cathartic and life changing to confront the issues they have around body shame, as we help them find positive ways of seeing their bodies,” Mandi says.
“We give them a gold pen and write positive words, and then they have an image that they can take away with them that celebrates and honours their body.
“The women who were the most hesitant were actually the ones who got the most out of it and I would encourage anyone considering it to read the first accounts on the Finding Venus Golden Shieldmaidens Facebook page,” she says.
“They came because they saw it as an act of courage and want to support the next generation to love their bodies.”
Mandi says the clay paint workshop has had a great turnout across the country so far, including 70 attendees in Upper Hutt and 20 in Bulls.
Other workshops on the day include a free journaling for creative wellness session, which “teaches emotional fluency to help turn down the volume of the mind’s critical voice”.
“We have traumas that are under the surface causing discomfort, but becoming fluent in expressing your emotion helps to surface and process them,” Mandi says.
There is also an option to attend a make-your-own journal workshop with Matakana’s Alysn Midgelow-Marsden, who is a world-renowned textile artist.
Then there is mother-daughter body compassion workshop, which teaches women and girls to treat their bodies as best friends.
Mandi started the Girl Power Series workshops after her five-year-old niece came into the kitchen and asked if she was fat.
“I started investigating and found that we see 400 to 600 photoshopped images each day. It’s not always a great thing when dealing with growing and changing bodies.”
The workshop series is funded by the Community Organisation Grants Scheme and has won the health and wellbeing category in the Wellington Community Awards.
Mandi was named Creative Photographer of the Year in 2017 by the NZ Institute of Pro Photographers.
To get a spot in any of the workshops, attendees need to book online at iamfindingvenus.com. The golden clay workshop is restricted to 18+.
