orange day – International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women
Orange the World – a campaign by the UN
The UN campaign "Orange the World" has been raising awareness of violence against women and girls since 1991: from the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women on November 25 to December 10, Human Rights Day. It has been part of the "UNiTE to End Violence against Women" campaign of the UN Secretary-General, conducted by UN Women, since 2008.
Stop violence against women
Violence against women is perpetrated by men in all social groups and in all areas of daily life. The violence is deeply rooted in our patriarchal structures and has profound consequences for the lives of women and for society as a whole.
- A man kills his (ex-)partner every two to three days; there is an attempted murder almost every day;
- A man inflicts violence on his (ex-)partner every 4 minutes;
- 63% of politically active women experience digital violence;
- 90% of young women feel strong to extreme fear when encountering unknown men at night.
Domestic violence against women: The numbers are clear, the suffering is hard to bear; and yet violence and especially those affected often remain invisible. What women experience in toxic relationships, the impact of violence on their lives, and how they find a way out and help is made visible by Alina Cyranek in her documentary FASSADEN. In FASSADEN, Sandra Hüller tells the story of a woman breaking free from a long-term violent relationship, as well as a political and social system that prefers to look away. The film shows the power structures behind the facades and how the state inadequately protects women. The narrative has been condensed from four real testimonials into a single story to preserve the anonymity of the women. All events actually occurred, nothing is fictional. A dance couple creates images of a relationship in a black box, highly aesthetic, physical, poetic, and thus allows room for the complexity and nuances of such a relationship. The manipulation of the woman is increasingly made visible through animation, as individual frames are printed on paper, edited, and reinserted into the live-action film. The classic documentary framework consists of expert interviews that clearly and factually categorize the power dynamics and relationship structures. FASSADEN is not an easily consumable film, but a challenge for the viewers. Domestic violence and the associated statistics are brutal, shocking, physical. FASSADEN reflects all of this in its form, it is radical and deliberately unconventional.
In short:
Alina Cyranek condenses the stories of four different women for her documentary film into a single narrative told by actress Sandra Hüller about domestic violence. It addresses the dynamics in toxic relationships, the violence exercised behind closed doors, and a political and societal system that shuts its eyes to the suffering of women.