Fall of Freedom

FALL OF FREEDOM:

WOMEN’S TESTIMONIES

Paintings by Anne Bedrick

The paintings in this series are not about despair, but endurance — a record of what it means to stay human, and a woman, as freedom dims. They give voice to this moment — a time of fear, mourning, and reckoning.

Each painting is a testimony, the women depicted are composites of collective experience.

The first painting in the series, “Woman on the Run”, speaks to what it means to be a woman in a world where boundaries and autonomy are continually tested. The second painting in the series, “Woman in Pieces”, depicts a woman trying to stay whole as the world rips her apart from the inside out. The third and fourth paintings, “Woman Becoming Warrior” and “Can You Hear the People Sing”, capture the arc from vulnerability to defiance, from grief to agency; the moment when fear turns into strength, when surviving becomes fighting back.

These paintings were made in fall 2025, as part of Fall of Freedom, a nationwide wave of creative resistance.