In pictures: Hope Shines through at Donegal Rape Crisis exhibition

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Hope, both bold and blossoming, shines out from an upstairs room of the Donegal County Museum this week.

The Donegal Sexual Abuse & Rape Crisis Centre’s fourth annual exhibition, now open to the public, explores the theme of hope in its many forms.

From a defiant Medusa to delicately emerging butterflies, the featured art pieces speak of recovery, regrowth, self-love and freedom. Featured artists range from age 17 and up.

The room is charged with a sense of courage and collaboration. This year, the centre worked with local organisations to creatively explore the shared journey taken by victims of sexual assault and violence.

For survivor Seán Molloy from Kilcar, hope has been hard won. After experiencing sexual assault at college in the UK, he stayed silent for seven years.

“I was an absolutely broken human. Completely broken. I couldn’t even look at people,” he said. When he eventually moved back to Donegal, he reached out to the Donegal Rape Crisis Centre.

Counselling was slow at first, he said, but hope and light came gradually.

“There were weeks where I didn’t want to speak,” he said. “My life is so different now.”

Seán has released a song titled It’s Not Your Fault, which finishes with the lyric ‘It’s not my fault’.

That became a turning point for Seán, and it’s an example of how creativity can inspire healing.

Now working in a job he loves, forging beautiful new connections and rekindling family relationships, Seán’s journey out of darkness is an inspiring one. He has dedicated all proceeds from the song to the Donegal Rape Crisis Centre.

“I don’t think I’d be alive if it wasn’t for these people,” he says

The audio is available to listen to as part of the exhibition, and since releasing the track, Seán has personally heard from many strangers who have also been impacted by sexual violence.

"If even just one person hears this and feels like they are enough, that what happened to them is not their fault, and that they don’t have to be defined by it, then this song has done what it was meant to do," he says.

Hope, and the courage it demands, is stitched through the entire exhibition.

Arts Therapist Michael O’Toole says that the exhibition grew from “a need for hope in our community, to be visible, to be heard, and to have different types of languages for people to feel that they can take up space in our community.”

Dance Movement Psychotherapist Noémie Cattez explained why the exhibition matters.

“Nobody really wants to walk into a place that’s called the rape crisis centre,” she said.

The introduction of creative therapies helps to balance the darkness that often brings people to the centre’s door.

“When someone comes to counselling, it can feel heavy, hopeless, and terrifying,” Noémie said.

“Creative work like this shows the flip side, not all sessions are doom and gloom. We’re trying to help people feel hope. That means having the dark and the light, the hopelessness with the hope. To have the fullness of the human experience seen and witnessed.”

Art requires no language, and creative work also offers a different doorway into connection.

“A lot of the art here wasn’t made by our clients, and a wide range of artistic modalities are represented, which is lovely," Noémie adds.

In the centre of the room is a table full of ceramic sunflowers, spread out like a meadow.

The Women’s Collective Ireland-Donegal worked with groups across the county, as well as members of An Garda Síochána and ATU Donegal’s Empower Her Society, to craft these flowers under the motto - ‘Be like a sunflower so that even on the darkest days you stand tall and find the sunlight’.

Chairperson of the voluntary Board of Directors, Paul Forrestal, spoke about what hope looks like inside the centre.

“Many people who come to us can’t see hope in their lives at that moment in time," he said.

"What we want to do is give that person the path towards hope, to make that hope grow towards contentment, happiness and moments of joy in their lives.”

The exhibition was aptly launched on Tuesday, on the first day of 16 Days of Action on Ending Violence Against Women and Girls.

Manager Noeleen Devenney reminded the room of the scale of the issue. “Globally, 370 million women and girls experience sexual violence before the age of 18.” She also noted the Irish statistic that 65 percent of women aged 18 to 24 reported sexual violence in their lifetime.

People often ask why case numbers of sexual violence in Donegal are high. “One of the reasons is the good relationship with the Gardaí, so we can report and feel safe in reporting,” says Noeleen.

Detective Inspector Siobhán Mollahan of the DPSU echoed this. “Because of the support of the Donegal Rape Crisis Centre, people feel able to come and report and go through what is a very harrowing criminal justice process.”

She described the exhibition as “a fabulous reflection of how people have felt able to express their feelings in a beautiful way,” adding that “there is help and light at the end of what can feel like a very long tunnel.”

The 2025 exhibition was made possible through collaboration with the Donegal Women’s Collective, the 4 Empowerment Project from Donegal Domestic Violence Services, the Men’s Shed, the Donegal Women’s Centre and the Donegal Volunteer Centre.

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The exhibition runs at the Donegal County Museum in Letterkenny from the 26th of November to the 6th of December 2025 and is open to all members of the public.

Selected artworks are available to purchase, with proceeds supporting the artists or the Donegal Rape Crisis Centre. Information on purchasing is available within the exhibition space.