The First Woman's Statue In Milan: This Is The Story Of The "Discovhery Billboards"

May. 10, 2022

On March 8, 2021, Terre des Hommes presented the "DiscovHery Billboards" campaign in several symbolic locations in Milan: a series of mini-outdoors that, thanks to a game of perspective, replaced the male statues of the city with female alternatives to raise awareness about the absence of monuments dedicated to great women. A few months and over 4,000 signatures collected later, the municipality inaugurated the first statue dedicated to a woman in the city.

There had never been a statue dedicated to a woman in Milan. And in a world where the career aspirations of girls and young women are strongly influenced by gender stereotypes, it is unacceptable for the new generations to only have male models to look up to. For this reason, Terre des Hommes, an NGO active for gender equality, launched the petition #UnaStatuaPerLeBambine (#AStatueForTheGirls) - inviting the inhabitants of Milan to sign asking the municipality to build the first statue of a woman in the city.

To promote the collection of signatures, Terre des Hommes together with ACNE Milan - the creative collective of the Deloitte family - created the "DiscovHery Billboards": the first mini-billboard campaign at child height that offers a new perspective on the monuments of the city - literally. Installed on March 8th, on International Women's Rights Day, the billboards were made specifically to host small statues of women and designed to be placed in specific points of the main squares of Milan so as to visually replace, thanks to a game of perspective, the male statues, creating an iconic k-visual to photograph and share online.

The "mini-statues" depicted Malala, Nobel Prize winner, activist, and symbol of all girls' rights, Nandhini, the brave 14-year-old Indian girl who escaped from her forced marriage, and Rita Levi Montalcini, model and guide for an entire generation of women in science. Three female characters symbolize the many women who have made a difference in history and who, like the many illustrious men who did, deserve to be remembered and celebrated in our squares.

Along with the statues, the invitation for citizens was literally to "change perspective": by framing the QR code, people were able to discover the stories of dozens of women who deserve a monument as well as access the petition to build the first female statue in the city.

The petition saw more than 4,000 citizens activate for Terre des Hommes, but the real impact was online: with zero media budget, the campaign had a reach of 48M thanks to the support of institutional representatives, celebrities, influencers, and journalists.

And finally, a few months after the campaign, the most important result of all arrived: the first statue of a woman in Milan, dedicated to Cristina Trivulzio di Belgiojoso, was finally inaugurated by Milan's Mayor Giuseppe Sala