A 21-year-old artist and feminist from Barcelona, Cinta Tort Cartró, who is known on social media as Zinteta, has been using her skills to turn stretch marks into works of art.Cartró’s Instagram feed is a gallery of reframed female bodies on which she has painted everything from rainbow stripes to pastel-colored lines and neon waves.Stretch marks are often seen as flaws or “imperfections,” Cartró told Yahoo Beauty, who explains that her stretch mark art first started as a “form of expression” before becoming a “social commentary on “male-dominated” culture.She says that her mission is to have women “stop hating” their stretch marks and embrace them instead.
Spanish artist uses art to encourage women to love their stretch marks. A 21-year-old artist and feminist from Barcelona, Cinta Tort Cartró, also known as social media as Zinteta, is on a mission to have women “stop hating” their stretch marks and embrace them instead. She has been painting everything from rainbow stripes to pastel-colored lines and neon waves on women’s bodies and posting them on her Instagram page to share her message.
Using her art as “social commentary.” Cartró told Yahoo Beauty that women often see their stretch marks as flaws or “imperfection.” She says that her stretch-mark-art first started as a “form of expression,” but turned into a “social commentary” on the “male-dominated culture we live in.”
Your “flaws” make you “unique” and “special.” Cartró said she became ready to alter the conversation when it comes to “society’s outdated beauty standards.” She explained to Yahoo Beauty, that she felt out of place when she was growing up because of her size. It has become important for her to tell other women through her art, she says, that the aspects of their bodies that they consider flaws are the things that make them “unique and special.”
Using art to destigmatize periods. Stretch marks aren’t the only things that Cartró has been working to destigmatize. She also thinks that women shouldn’t be ashamed of their period stains and among her collection are photos of women wearing underwear adorned with rainbow splotches.
Using art to spread the message of “self-love and acceptance.” Cartró, who is from a small town in Barcelona called Torrelles de Llobregat, just graduated from the University of Barcelona with a teaching degree. She says that she has always loved to create art, however, and is now using the medium to encourage women to “self-love and acceptance.”
A way to fight for justice. Cartró says that for her art is a way to fight for justice. She says it can also be used to start conversations on difficult topics to address like racism and sexism.
She wondered why she did the things she did. In an interview with metro.co.uk, Cartró said in Spanish, that it was about a year ago that she began to question her reasons for doing some of the things she did to her body. She said that her questioning was empowering and led her to a deeper sense of self-love.
Women are under body pressure. he said that becoming aware of the things she did to her body to hide her perceived flaws also ushered in a stage of her career in which her art reflects the “the pressure there is towards women and their bodies.” She hopes that by painting rainbow colors on women’s stretch marks, she says, that women will reconsider how they feel about the parts of their bodies they have taught to hate.
Addressing the “taboo around menstruation.” It was 7 months ago that Cartró started her project “Mancho y no me doy asco,” or “I’m not disgusted by my stains.” Apart from releasing women from shame, she says, that she also wanted to address the “taboo around menstruation.”
Periods are not unnatural. Cartró says that it surprises her that in the 21st century that people still consider periods to be unnatural. People still have difficulty talking about menstruation, she says.
Periods are normal and natural. Cartró says that she wasn’t taught about the menstrual cycle in school but that since learning about its phases, she is able to use them to her benefit. She also says that since she started using “the cup” she is even more aware of the process and just how natural and normal it is, as opposed to something to hide.
She was terrified of stains during her period. The Spanish artist says that she remembers being terrified when in school, at the prospect of staining her chair with blood. She says that the thought of what people would think would make her panic.
”Stains happens.” Painting on underwear, says Cartró, has given her the ability to tell women that “stains happen,” but nothing else happens afterward. The artist’s willingness to broach topics about women’s relationships to their bodies and self-love comes from her own battle with an eating disorder and distorted body image.
She suffered from an eating disorder. Cartró says that she had anorexia at the age of 14 as a result of all her body insecurities. She says that a “tall, bigger girl with stretch marks,” she desired the “perfect body society accepts.”
The journey to “self-love and acceptance” is worth it. According to Cartró, the “journey to self-love and acceptance wasn’t easy.” It was well-worth the effort, however, she says, in fact, “it’s been incredibly rewarding.”
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