The Defiant Dress

This set piece is the plot driver; it's an homage to Reena Virk, a B.C. teenager murdered by her peers. The front bears words the creator wished had been in Reena's head; the back bears the cigarette burns and handprints of the two young people who murdered her.

I, Charlotte Mercer, the artist/curator of this exhibition made this dress. It did not come from someone else.

I’ve had a great rich life with loving parents. I grew up in Langley and I’ve never had a crisis or faced a daunting challenge. My life has been blessed. I’ve never taken for granted my good fortune in being born in Canada and into a family that has never experienced hunger or fear. We weren’t rich but we never wanted for anything.

When I started to put this show together, I wished I’d celebrated some proud accomplishment by making or buying a brilliant dress. But I didn’t. Yet I wanted to put something into the show. Here’s what happened.

One of my favourite heroines in life ever, was Jeanne d’Arc and so she was my first thought but she doesn’t fit into my thesis.  But when I thought of her, I often picture her wearing armour and when I thought of armour, I don’t know why but for some reason I said to myself; “I wish Reena Virk had had some armour.”

I had my idea. I’d make her the armour she never and needed. It’d be my tribute to her. No child should be murdered, especially at the hands of other kids she thought were friends. My horror and sorrow over her story as it played out in the press made me love her.

It’s tree-shaped because she was murdered on a wild beach under a wooden pier. It's the colour and texture of bone to make us think of her grievous injuries. I read things and heard things on TV kids said about her… behind her back; things said that destroyed her armour of self-respect.  And I thought of the words that we should have seen emanating from her face.

Rest in peace Reena. I wish you eternal paradise.