ABOUT

Child abuse can take many forms. Emotional, physical, sexual, and neglect. It can happen to any child, in any family, anywhere. Sadly, research has shown that many people who are abused as children go on to become abusers themselves. It's a cycle that can echo through generations, quietly, violently, invisibly, becoming a dark and hugely damaging legacy.

This work confronts that legacy head-on.

Rather than simply showing a child as a victim, this concept goes deeper, depicting the terrifying potential of what that child might become. The image shows a baby with adult fists, those of a future abuser. The child hasn’t just been affected by abuse; he’s already been marked by it. They are his future. The juxtaposition is immediate and jarring. These fists are shaping his future. Their presence alludes to inherited trauma, to the inescapable shadow many abused children grow up under. The stark and powerful knuckles hint at a specific, personal kind of menace, making the image feel less abstract and more devastatingly real.

At its core, "Break the Cycle" is a visceral visual metaphor. It captures the inescapable grip of generational trauma, how abuse, if left unaddressed, replicates itself. Of course, not every abused child becomes an abuser. But some do. And too many live with its scars.

Shot in high-contrast black and white, the composition is stripped of distractions. The viewer’s eye is drawn to the unsettling mismatch between the baby’s soft, expressionless face and the hardened, violent fists replacing his hands. A single, chilling statistic drives the message home:

“30% of abused children become abusers. And so on. And so on. And so on.”

It’s deliberately uncomfortable, because it should be. Each repetition becomes a punch, amplifying the impact and emphasising the potential cycle of abuse. But there is hope. The simple, direct call to action invites the viewer to support the NSPCC’s essential work in breaking this pattern. It makes clear that while the cycle is real, it can be broken.

This creative work has the power not just to provoke, but to protect. And shows us that when we confront uncomfortable truths, we give children a fighting chance at something better.