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The Silent Witness Project is an international initiative that began in 1990 to make visible the tragic results of domestic violence, educate people about its prevalence, and advocate for an end to it.
A group of women artists and writers in Minnesota, disturbed by the growing number of women in their communities being murdered by their partners, joined forces with several women’s organizations to create the Arts Action Against Domestic Violence.
To speak out against escalating domestic violence in their state, they set out to create an installation to commemorate the lives of the 26 women lost to domestic violence that year.
After much brainstorming, the women began to design 26 free-standing, life-sized red wooden figures, each bearing the name of a woman who once lived, worked, had neighbors, friends, family, children – whose life ended violently at the hands of an intimate partner or stalker. A twenty-seventh figure was added to represent those uncounted women whose murders went unsolved or were erroneously ruled accidental.
The organizers called the figures the Silent Witnesses.
On February 18, 1991, more than 500 women met at a church across the street from the Minnesota State Capitol to showcase with the newly-constructed Witnesses lined up at the front of the sanctuary. The women formed a silent procession escorting the figures in single file across the street, up the steps, and into the State Capitol Rotunda for public viewing as statements about the tragedy of how their lives ended.
The sheer volume of space the figures occupied spoke of their power… and the loss. The Silent Witness Exhibit was officially launched. A press conference highlighted the exhibit’s purpose and goals for eliminating domestic violence murders.
Inspired by the impact of the exhibit, a few of the project supporters came together with Janet Hagberg and Jane Zeller in 1994 with the determination to create a larger goal, namely the formation of a national initiative dedicated to the elimination of domestic murders. It was then that a five-part process model evolved starting with the creation of Silent Witnesses Exhibits in all 50 states.
By September 1995, a total of 800 Silent Witnesses had been created representing women who were killed as a result of domestic violence in seventeen states. By February 1996 twenty-four states were involved, and all fifty states had joined the initiative by 1997.
Today, the Silent Witness Project is an international force with displays in all 50 states and 23 countries.
The Northwest Ohio chapter was founded in 2001 by the BGSU Women’s Center. In 2017, the collection moved to Bethany House, where it continues to be housed and maintained.
Our local exhibit features more than 50 figures and dozens of retired chest plates, each representing a life abruptly and violently ended by an intimate partner or stalker.
The goals of this exhibit are to:
Each year, we kick off October’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month with the Northwest Ohio Silent Witness Project Unveiling Ceremony, memorializing women and girls who were killed in acts of domestic violence. Over the past decade, 44 such murders have occurred in our community.
Beginning Domestic Violence Awareness Month by honoring the women and girls whose lives were violently taken remains important and impactful. We cannot bring back the women and girls represented in the Northwest Ohio Silent Witness Project, but we can refuse to forget them. We can bear unflinching witness to their humanity and suffering, and by doing so, let the people who loved and long for them know that they are not alone. We stand beside them in their grief.
In order to keep the Silent Witness display current, figures are “retired” after ten years. However, their chest plates are kept and displayed at the annual Unveiling Ceremony every October. Below are some photos from the 2024 Unveiling Ceremony, showing some of the victims remembered and the chest plates from retired figures.
WTOL captured footage of this year’s Unveiling Ceremony. See the news report below.
Sponsored Ministry of the Sisters of St. Francis of Sylvania, Ohio
Member of the Sylvania Franciscan Ministries