Sacred Rage Project
Kat's powerful 'Sacred Rage' exhibition took place on 2nd April 2023 at the Trestle Arts Centre in St Albans, in support of International Women's Day.
You can learn more about Kat's inspiration for the exhibition and view photos on the Sacred Rage Exhibition page.
Below, you can see the wonderful paintings Kat produced for this project - and the words of the women behind the paintings.
UNFAIR
I have sacred rage for my inner child, who was abused at the hands of a man who was supposed to protect her.
I have sacred rage for not being able to own my sexuality as a woman because men took that from me.
I have sacred rage for Natalie McNally and all other women like her who have been murdered by the men out there who think we are disposable to them.
I have sacred rage for the times I have had to adjust my behaviour or what I’m wearing and how I look in order to appear less attractive to predatory behaviour from men.
I have sacred rage for being afraid to walk alone in case I’m approached or attacked.
ABANDONED
I hold sacred rage for a half century of injustices to my body and soul.
I hold sacred rage for surviving sexual abuse as a child.
I hold sacred rage for being abandoned over and over and over again.
I hold sacred rage for surviving purity culture within the confines of a cult run by abusive, patriarchal religious “leaders.”
I hold sacred rage for being told my only real value in life was being a wife and mother.
I hold sacred rage for being raised in a system of indoctrination which taught me to distrust my body and my inner knowing.
I hold sacred rage for suffering an entire lifetime with undiagnosed ADHD. I was finally diagnosed in my 40’s only after suffering through childhood unassisted, barely making it through college, and dropping out of graduate school. My school report cards all said the same thing: “She has so much potential if she would just apply herself”, as though I wasn’t trying.
I hold sacred rage for the maternity care that my country fails to provide its mothers with. I was made to return to a full-time job just eight weeks following the surgical births of my children. I was neither healed nor ready to return, but I did not have a choice. Leaving my babies was among the most excruciating things I've ever had to do.
I hold sacred rage for the debilitating postpartum depression, anxiety, and rage issues I suffered with so badly. I frequently considered taking my own life.
I hold sacred rage for the abuses I have suffered as a woman working in the patriarchal American healthcare system.
I hold sacred rage for all of these things contributing to the hate and disgust I had for my own body for an entire lifetime.
It is time to take back my power, my inner knowing, my autonomy and my BODY!
It is time for me to radically love and accept my beautiful body for the gift that it is. It has walked me through half a century on this planet, borne and nourished children, allowed me to feel pleasure, pain, and every emotion in between, and it continues to carry my soul through this life regardless of what abuses it has suffered.
Armed with the Goddess Ariadne’s sword (truth) and red thread (intuition), I have walked the complicated twists and turns of the labyrinthian dark night of the soul to face my own demons and slay them. As I make my way back out of the labyrinth, guided by the red thread of inner knowing and intuition, I am ready to shed my old life and take up my new life, one in which I am myself a powerful goddess in full control and ownership of myself, my life, and my body!
May women the world over unite in SACRED RAGE!!
UNSEEN
I hold sacred rage for all the times I’ve had to move for my safety away from strange men.
I hold sacred rage for the changes I force on myself to be successful in a man’s world.
I hold sacred rage for all the things I’ve missed out on because of juggling the full-time job of motherhood with business and employment.
I hold sacred rage for all the years that flew by as a result, which I can never get back.
I hold sacred rage over the fact that I’ve had to learn to love my natural body.
I hold sacred rage for the women still learning and the ones that will never learn.
I hold sacred rage because my body is either sexualised or shamed, there is no in between.
I hold sacred rage because in the 21st century, contraception and hormonal intervention is still a woman’s problem.
I hold sacred rage for the wise crone women who feel unseen.
I feel sacred rage for the young maiden girl who is sexualised under the adult male gaze.
TORMENT
My sacred rage rose from a lump in my throat.
A girl silenced by religion masking as community.
An institution built on the blood and sweat of women who suffered in silence,
Ruled by men with allegiance to a god who is not love.
My sacred rage swelled as the ocean waves,
A young mother, a portal of life.
A creator who knew not who she was apart from who she had been told to be.
Hell would swallow her whole, they said, if she dared to speak her truth.
Literal fiery torment, created by a god who is not love.
My sacred rage roared so loudly in my ears that I could no longer contain it.
As a woman, eyes wide open, seeing herself in her full glory.
Equal, not less than the men atop their pompous pedestals,
Who desperately cling to a god who is not love.
My sacred rage set fire to every last cord that was tied ‘round my spirit,
To keep her hidden away.
This flame I must tend, to serve as a beacon,
To the girls with lumps in their throats.
Silenced by those who want them to believe in a god,
Who is not love.
TRAPPED
I hold sacred rage for the young me who had to always say yes and for the me now, who has only just learnt how to say no.
I hold sacred rage for the Cushing's Syndrome that meant society would not accept me - I could not accept me!
I hold sacred rage for all the doctors who couldn't be bothered to find out about my condition and for making me explain it again and again.
I hold sacred rage for the adults who called me fat, the kids who called me fat when I was younger and the years of healing that meant I had to do.
I hold sacred rage for women who feel they have to hide scars because society finds them repulsive.
I hold sacred rage because menopause and menstrual cycle are still seen as things women can get over.
I hold sacred rage for the young girls growing into an overly sexualised world where padded training bras are a thing!!!
I feel sacred rage for every January's shit advertising, pursuing women to lose their Christmas weight, get slim, starve themselves and be what society wants. I could go on....
This raw work that Kat is doing has, for the first time, given me a chance to show all of me - me. I can see myself through someone else. I can finally let go of the claws that Cushing's Syndrome had in me and I can let go of 23 years. For the first time, someone has given me an opportunity to feel the pain, sit with it, be with that young girl and embrace the woman I am today.
JUDGEMENT
I hold Sacred Rage over the diet and fitness industry, brainwashing us into thinking we must be thinner, leaner, more muscly.
I hold Sacred Rage over the glossy magazines, airbrushing bodies to hide their 'flaws'.
I hold Sacred Rage over society, dictating how we should look, what we should wear, how we should behave.
I hold Sacred Rage over our female ancestors, persecuted and repressed when they were deemed too strong or empowered.
I hold Sacred Rage over male-dominated governments, making laws to decide what women are/aren't allowed to do with their bodies.
I hold Sacred Rage over the women who choose to bring down other women, instead of supporting them.
I hold Sacred Rage over the victims of sexual assaults, who are too scared to report it as that they don't think they'll be believed, and that when they do report it, they are judged, scrutinised and investigated more than their offenders.
BETRAYED
My Sacred Rage is sexual abuse, religious trauma, and betrayal.
Growing up, I lived in a toxic home. My mother was an alcoholic, and my father sexually abused me. He would also watch me shower and undress. In my late teen years, I met my soon-to-be ex-husband. He was a Mormon (The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints). He introduced me to the church, which I wound up joining. A year after joining this highly demanding religion, I married him in the temple. He "rescued" me from a terrible family life and brought me into the "light".
Being in the Mormon church was extremely demanding, especially for women. We didn't have a voice, men ruled, and women were expected to serve till their souls bled, all while keeping a smile on our faces and having "faith". It was absolute bullshit!
Fast forward a year from the date I got married. My ex started watching pornography and messaging women for nude pictures. Then he started spying on me while changing and showering (sound familiar?). He would even take pictures of me while showering without me knowing. I would be bathing my little ones in the tub, and he would sneak up behind me to peek under my nightgown to see my vagina. I would go out with friends, and he would hide a tape recorder in the car to make sure I wasn't cheating. I NEVER in our 21 years of marriage gave him a reason to even think I was cheating. I'm insanely loyal and would never do such a thing!
Did I mention 21+ years with this man? Yes, I did! In the church, we are expected to forgive, turn the other cheek, have faith, and move on. That's why I stayed so long! I'm so fucking pissed, hurt, RAGEFUL - all the words!!!!
For me, the Mormon church is a cult full of lies, gaslighting, shame, and isn't true, and this is another fucking thing that I'm pissed off about! I'm so out of that bullshit!
Going back a little bit. I ate my feelings away, I gained and lost hundreds of pounds throughout my marriage and time as a Mormon. My body has gone through hell and back. I have extra skin, stretch marks, and wrinkles from all the sick shit that has happened to me for the past 21+ years.
But I've also given birth to 3 beautiful children whom I love with all that I am! I appreciate my body for protecting me and helping me to grow these amazing creatures! Am I at peace with my body? Not yet, but I'm getting there.
DISGUSTED
I hold Sacred Rage over men seeing women as a piece of meat. I hold Sacred Rage over being seen as less than.
I hold Sacred Rage over the fact that men think they can tell women what to do with our bodies! I hold Sacred Rage over the fact my daughter has to grow up with this patriarchy bullshit.
I hold Sacred Rage over being catcalled. I hold Sacred Rage over feeling disgusted by the way guys think they are allowed to talk to us.
INTIMIDATED
I hold sacred rage that every time I’ve been out at night in pubs or clubs, or at gigs or on the street, that I’ve been made to feel scared, felt unsafe or intimidated, and feared being raped, verbally abused or physically or sexually assaulted.
UNSTOPPABLE
I hold sacred rage because of the stories which still shackle me. I was taught that women should serve, and I did not ever know I could put myself first. I did not know I could choose me! My blood boils when I think of all the unaware years. It took a personal crisis and some therapy in my late 40s for me to realise I could give myself permission to be who I wanted, to like what I wanted, to WANT what I wanted... instead of seeking permission elsewhere or trying to conform to someone else's idea of WOMAN. I claim my power now, and my desires! I am a goddess, and I will not be stopped!
I'm reclaiming my body. After living through the trauma of someone else claiming power over my body. Having no autonomy of body and self. Someone else thinking they have the right to me at any time they want. Them telling me what my body likes. Years of me not being able to trust myself, my body and all the emotions, feelings, thoughts and sensations it experiences. Years of hating myself and my body. Years of suffering quietly, being submissive to others. Not anymore. Claiming my sacred rage is me saying it's not fucking ok what happened to me. No one has the right to control me or my body.
HIDING
I was never the pretty one, and I was never the skinny one. Apparently never the clever one either and everyone, especially my family, always told me that if I didn’t lose weight, if I didn’t dress more feminine, if I didn’t learn to clean the house properly or cook, I would never be able to find a man. And this is what I believed.
I was hiding my body. Wearing only loose-fitting clothes. Hiding my legs, hiding my arms - feeling ugly.
Until I went on a holiday to London. I’m originally from Germany, but in London, no one cared how I looked, no one looked at me, I was just a woman. So going back to Germany, I made a pact and a plan with myself and for myself. I left it all behind, and I moved to London. And just like a caterpillar, I transformed into a butterfly.
I dressed more feminine, I put on more make up, I felt feminine, and free and light. I wasn’t a big fat woman anymore, stomping around and not being able to find a man because I was too fat and not girly enough. I suddenly was able to feel like a woman just because I was in a place where it was okay to be a big and beautiful. I could feel feminine and walk feminine and move feminine even as a size 18/20.
My rage was always internal. And it still is. I was always suffering from the inside. I was never screaming and shouting. I was never complaining. Only I knew what was going on.
12 years later, today, I feel amazing. I’m still a big girl, and I always will be. But along my way, I met beautiful men who loved me and my body and I learnt how to cook because I wanted to, not because I had to find a man. I went from wide trousers to wearing skirts. From loose-fitting T-shirts to figure-hugging shirts and crop tops and dresses, and I feel beautiful.
I feel rage towards society and all the magazines and social media platforms and people who think they know better, and think they have the right to tell me and everyone else what I can be and what I cannot be. How I can or cannot look and if I can have a partner in my life or not solely based on my looks. Fuck them. I feel like a goddess and I feel like a queen. I feel beautiful. I don’t have to scream or shout, I can just be me. My presence in my aura is enough to kick ass.
But I hate what society is doing to everyone else. To the young girls out there. I will never stop fighting just to be able to be myself. I will never stop telling my inner child that all those people telling me that I wasn’t pretty enough or skinny enough and that I would never find someone who loves me were wrong. I am not worthless.
I will not fight back in anger, I will fight back with love and compassion. Teaching others that they can be whoever they want to be. They are beautiful. Teach them to use their energy wisely.
I am beautiful and I always was no matter what others told me. I am enough and I always was.
I will never give others the power to pull me down again. I want them to look at me and see what amazing life I was able to build myself as a 'fat' woman.
Because it’s not about looks. It’s about the size of our heart - and mine is huge. So of course, I have a big body because my heart needs a lot of space!
Fuck the haters and fuck everyone who thinks it’s okay to tell people how they need to be in order to be a good person. Spread love, not hate!
VULVA
I feel the sacred rage of the Sheela-na-gig. I resonate and vibrate with it, finally understand it, embrace it and admire it.
While many men say they love our vaginas, in truth they don’t. They can’t even call this sacred portal by its correct name: Vulva, or better yet, YONI!
They use endless demeaning euphemisms, tell us their preferences, and pressure us to conform. We should be hairless, prepubescent-looking (naïve & controllable), floral scented, neat and tucked, slick and snug, but no blood (horror of horrors!), nor open, or fulsome with emerging new life, bulging and distended as the downy dome of a new baby makes its entrance. And definitely not spread open by the Queen who owns herself, revealing her power, her ability to create, channel, transform, transcend…
They theorise the grotesquery that the Sheela is meant to terrorise, thus divulging their true feeling towards her, towards us: FEAR. They fear our sacred gateway, our yonis, they fear our power.
DESPERATION
Can you feel the beating of the drum? The ancestral call of rage and pain. It fires our anger, and we feel the searing of heat as well as the flickers of pain. Endless memories of being overpowered with the stench of smoke in our nostrils. I weep for my sisters as they wipe dripping leftovers away, sewing your seeds of hatred. Adding to the ever-constant precautions always being ready for a fight. Years have floated by as the burnt ash disperses on the wind; the screams fading in the distance. The sacred rage has boiled over, I will not be silent anymore. I won't be politely laughing at your fucking jokes as your eyes leer over my curves. My desperation for my daughter to live in equality grows as the embers of reality make me seethe.
SEXUALITY
I hold sacred rage because my sexuality is used to ease the burdens and needs of men. My sexuality has been stolen for profit. My sexuality has been diminished to body parts and getting high instead of the true Divine Feminine glory that is all of me. And not only me. All women have been victims of the patriarchy and purity culture. My sacred rage is for myself, my daughters, the little girls told to sit like a lady, the men who believe their wives should be ladies in the parlour and whores in the bedroom. The misogyny against all women and their glorious beauty fuels my sacred rage. I am reclaiming my sexuality.
SILENCED
I hold Sacred Rage towards society and the patriarchy for attempting to suppress my power. I have listened to your messages, and this is a message for you.
You detached me from my truth, you bury our stories of the Matriarch and you disrespect the teachings of my ancestors. You made me doubt myself when I shouldn't have and made me truly believe my "self" was never enough. You made me think I had to change so much about myself to conform to your ideal.
You objectified me. You gave me numbers as an identity. You stalk me. You took away my voice.
You hid things from me that should have never have been hidden. You put shame on me and made me carry it for years, reinforcing my doubt and insecurities. You fed me toxic shit about what I "should" want in life.
You ran me into the ground, watching me burn out whilst still telling me to "do better next time". You controlled me, used me like a puppet and made me feel weak without your strings. You played tricks on me - mind games.
Each time I came close to stepping into my power, you found a way to get into my head and put out the fire inside of my belly.
You kept me in the dark about who I was and manipulated me to believe it was not safe to show my "self". You behaved like a narcissistic friend, gaslighting me until I fell for your bullshit but pulling me in just enough to trick me into thinking you cared. You taught me to abuse myself, to mistrust others and to lose faith in faith itself.
You made me feel guilt, shame and disgust for my body. You made me hate my own beautiful, stunning, powerful body. You made me feel guilt, shame and disgust for my blood. My womb magic, my root, my foundation, my natural cycles and my connection with nature and the Universe.
You made me feel like you owned me, that I was in debt to your fabricated greatness. You made me feel that I was just an obligation to men, that I should serve them 'quietly'. That men make the final decision, men must be served first, that I should put my dreams on hold in the interest of man.
You pushed your masculine views on me, pushing my power and inner truths deeper inside me, to a place I could no longer reach. You disabled my passion, my sensuality, my desires, my pleasures and replaced them with conformity out of pure fear.
You dug your dirty hook into my precious skin and dragged me down into your materialistic, stagnant, egotistical sinkhole. You took advantage of my true, soft, feminine nature, infecting me with your poison, subduing me into a state of dependency.
You made me forget that it is my birthright to have boundaries and say NO.
Well, YOU can go FUCK YOURSELVES.