This embroidery depicts an outline of Sarah Baartman, a young Khoi woman kidnapped from South Africa and displayed in Europe as 'The Hottentot Venus'. It is inspired by a 19th century french print in which Sarah Baartman is nude, being gawked at by a group of european aristocrats. The red on the white handkerchief becomes symbolic of the violence acted out against Sarah Baartman and her dignity as a woman of colour.
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