Portrait – Nadia Murad

Nadia Murad — Are You Only Listening to Half the Story?

This portrait of Nadia Murad is the beginning of a new Red Flags series within Women’s Work — a series that asks us to look beyond the first, most visible part of a story.

Nadia Murad is a Yazidi woman, survivor and human rights advocate. In 2014, ISIS attacked the Yazidi community in northern Iraq, killing men and boys and capturing thousands of women and children. Nadia was among those taken captive and subjected to sexual violence. She escaped and made the courageous decision to speak publicly about what had happened — not only to herself, but to her community and to other survivors.

Her testimony took her from a village in Iraq to the United Nations and, ultimately, to the Nobel Peace Prize. But I don’t want this portrait to tell only the story of what was done to Nadia.

The hidden words within the work are words I would rather see written across a billboard than concealed within the fabric. They are warnings, questions and uncomfortable truths that deserve to be seen.

Because there is another story here: a people targeted because of who they are; families destroyed and communities displaced; women and children still seeking justice; and a survivor who refused to let her story end with what was done to her.

Nadia became a voice for the Yazidi people and for survivors of sexual violence, using her own experience to demand recognition, accountability and protection for others.

Are you only listening to half the story?