MEXICO: Against the GBV pandemic

Just weeks into 2020, artist and women’s rights activist Isabel Cabanillas was found dead in Ciudad Juárez, a day after being reported missing. The killing sparked a renewed wave of protests against gender-based violence. Days earlier, activists had placed hundreds of red women’s shoes on Mexico City’s main square to call public attention to the fact that, on average, 10 women and girls are murdered in Mexico every single day, and less than 10 per cent of femicide cases are ever solved. The protest was a repeat of a performance first staged by artist Elina Chauvet in 2009 after the killing of her sister.

Protests continued throughout Mexico all year long.