English
About the performance – Patchworkgirl is a poignant lecture-performance about sexting, exposing, slutshaming and owning your sexuality. When journalist Jantine Jongebloed was 16, the trashy Dutch website GeenStijl published her nudes. When Cyrina was 13, a sexy video of her was distributed at secondary schools in her village. In this performance, Jantine reconstructs the events from her past. For this, she uses the internet she was once a victim of. Five teenage girls from the MBO Theatre School re-enact the Jantine of 16 and portray the perpetrators. Through a voice-over, Cyrina also shares her story. With A.I. artist Noelía, they create an avatar, based on Jantine’s nudes. This virtual girl first embodies the ‘male fantasy’ to attract attention. Then she is ‘dressed’ with photos of skin from the audience. Protected by this, the avatar enters expose groups and porn sites. There, through performance and poetry, she engages in dialogue with visitors on behalf of victims, giving women back control over their own stories.
During the making process of Patchwork Girl, all kinds of obstacles made the (absent) ethics of the internet crystal clear. On the one hand, it turned out to be illegal to create a naked avatar, while on the other, countless men post private images of real women online. The creators decided to make these obstacles the core of the show.
The performance Patchwork Girl has won the Ars Electronica Award for Digital Humanity 2024: the grand prize of the prestigious Ars Electronica Festival, one of the world’s biggest art and media events. The international expert jury was full of praise for our performance. Patchwork Girl was chosen from 3,000 international entries from over 80 countries and, in addition to the Golden Nica, wins 10,000 euros.
