Jenifer Arbaugh

Jenifer Arbaugh VS Y&H Corporation
photography
41 x 31 in.

On November 8, 2001, I filed a lawsuit claiming sexual harassment against my former boss.  On February 22, 2006 at the U.S. Supreme Court, my case was finally closed.

Late one evening in October I was closing up the bar and restaurant that I worked at when he came behind the bar, restrained me, and stuck his hand up my skirt.  People mentioned to me that I shouldn’t have been working at a bar in first place, but I am not sure that those individuals ever knew what it was like to work and live on their own. Without a degree it is easy for women to be drawn to the working lifestyle of late hours and descent money in order to make rent.  I loved to tend bar, it is a job just like any other job.

In my works titled “Jenifer Arbaugh vs Y&H Corporation” I incorporated text and image to re-tell my story in a more personal light. I photographed my self in three separate images to represent the stages that I went through during the 5 year trial.  I created mock portraits of the 8 Justices that voted on my case during the final trial.  The feet are the beginning stages and it continues up from there. The images all together are almost actual size and shown in the book as they are intended to be hung but due to the sizes I chose to show the mid sections and the artist book only.

© Jenifer Arbaugh