Paintings being used to continue campaign against violence
THE Caribbean American Domestic Violence Awareness (CADVA) organisation continued to promote its message of ‘Break the Silence and Say No to Violence’ through a one-day art exhibition at the Pegasus Hotel, in Kingston, Georgetown, on Tuesday.
This first ever series of paintings, by internationally recognised contemporary Guyanese artist Carl Anderson, themed ‘Reflections: The Faces of Domestic Violence’, was unveiled in the ‘Ancient County’ of Berbice, to coincide with the ‘Break Your Silence and Become a Survivor – Understanding Abuse and Moving Beyond’ workshop sequence held there.
It started on March 5, at the University of Guyana (UG), Tain, Corentyne Campus, followed by other seminars and showings of the artwork in Berbice, on March 6, at Mibicuri Community Developers at Mibicuri Government Compound, Black Bush Polder; March 7, at the Transitional House in New Amsterdam; March 10, RHMA World Harvest-Alpha Children’s Home in Gay Park, New Amsterdam and March 12, at the Roadside Baptist Church, Number 68 Village, Corentyne.
The mission of CADVA Inc is to provide a safe environment where individuals and communities can converge, listen, share and receive information to help combat domestic violence. It will help to combat domestic violence and educate those experiencing abuse.
Speaking to the Guyana Chronicle, Founder of the organization, which was launched globally last February, in Florida, United States (U.S.), Ms. Sukree Boodram said: “I want to leave a roadmap and a legacy for any one person who thinks they cannot make a difference in the world.”
She said she hopes that CADVA helps to make a difference in people’s lives. “Break the Silence, Say No to Violence has been the message for the third year.
“It’s now a coined phrase under the umbrella of CADVA,” said Boodram, who is the author of Breakout, having been a victim who became a survivor.
Using her personal journey through healing and recovery, she has committed to helping others to break their silence and create healthier choices, change their status and become an empowered survivor. Her hope is that each victim becomes empowered to feel they deserve better treatment from the one person who claimed to have loved them.
Boodram said the focus will be on the Berbice area for the next two years and may make appearances in the remote regions, noting that Guyana has embraced this initiative to help put an end to domestic violence and she hopes that it continues.

OPPORTUNITY
She took the opportunity to thank Caribbean Airlines and the Pegasus Hotel for their support in making this exercise possible.
Chief Operations Officer of CADVA, Ms. Dianne Madray, who was the facilitator of the Berbice workshops, said each one of the paintings is telling a story.
“In each of them, you will see a reflection of what domestic violence does and we added two pieces in this series on child abuse. We are kind of expanding on that because we started looking at trauma and abuse in this whole series,” she explained.
Madray said, in Berbice, the response was tremendous at each venue and opened up a lot of dialogue, noting that a lot of men and women “who have been experiencing abuses came out” as well as children.
“…people were just breaking the silence in this process,” she said, adding: “We carried the paintings at each venue; we used the paintings to create that dialogue and moved into the workshops,” she said.
“… when we come back, later this year, we are taking it one step further and will be looking at the perpetrator.”
CADVA Inc., a U.S. registered non-profit organisation, is led by individuals with a passion for the cause and their primary purpose is to build public awareness, educate, develop and teach a sense of self-worth and respect to individuals, by providing counselling, training and other related services to victims of abuse and their families.
It is focusing, initially, on the U.S. and Caribbean where large pockets of cultural demographics exist in communities and domestic violence is not openly discussed or help not easily found. Most of these areas already have existing agencies that provide services to victims and their families. However, the outreach between those agencies and the community needs reinforcement and CADVA Inc. will partner with agencies already existing to bring help to victims and their families.