The works I'm sharing today are a part of my series called Arcana Ma. I won't share all of the work today but you can find more at my website. Arcana meaning mysteries and Ma as in mother: Mysteries of Motherhood. This series addresses the complex nature of the mother-child relationship and my personal struggles with motherhood as an institution within a patriarchal society. While it highlights emotional taboos, it also features the joyous emotional highs that come with being someone's mama.
Always Lonely, Never Alone
is a sentiment that many new (or newish) mothers can relate to. This piece speaks to the duality of touch within motherhood. It can be so overwhelming one moment, and the next, it can be one of the most healing and incredible parts of parenting. I am overwhelmed with love for my child yet, the institution of motherhood can hang heavy over me. As a new mother, I wondered when, if ever, I would have my body to myself again- especially during the extended breastfeeding years. I was navigating a sense of loss and a struggle for my own identity. As a stay-at-home mother, I deeply felt the effects of my isolation even when struggling for moments of solitude. Tea, acrylic, thread, and parchment baking paper were used to represent the feeling of being submerged in, yet at odds with, domestic life, the isolation of motherhood, and the intense demands of the mother-child relationship.
Difficult Mother
To become a mother is to face your deepest, darkest psychological bullshit and to consciously unwind and heal it while being the main caregiver to this tiny being. A mother in the eyes of her child is a great goddess. She is the whole world, your greatest love and life force. She sometimes may also be a snapping, fire-breathing dragon, your greatest fear. I think most parents can identify with feeling rage at times. It's not an easy thing to admit. I have seen how trauma is passed from mother to daughter through the decades, a lineage of pain. It is my job to heal my shadow-self so my daughter does not inherit old wounds. This painting is what came out of knowing that I often fail my daughter and my descendants in my motherhood. It is a symbol of my greatest fear, a reminder of what I do not want to become and to avoid a mother-child relationship defined by its traumas.
Winter Blues
Seasonal depression and pandemic isolation get in the way of being present with my child.
I Love You So Much This painting is about that intense love, the high you feel in a moment of presence with your child.
Barely Here (Feeling Tender)
Being highly sensitive, parenting is tough on the emotional and nervous systems. Checking out, numbing, daydreaming, and hiding are not suitable balms. But I find myself relying on them more than I would like. Feeling foggy headed, full of love and guilt.
Milk Drunk
Aisthesis~ the exchange of soul essence between beings. If you have breastfed your baby you know what this means...but only if you managed to get through cracked and bleeding nipples, low milk supply or painful overproduction, bitting, scratching, mastitis, or any of the many other things that make breastfeeding such a difficult job. This piece is about the high you get when it all goes right. That unreal powerful love that becomes so strong when that little milk-drunk face stares up at you with wide sparkling eyes.
Don't Fuckin' Touch Me This small work was created from my memory of how I felt during the late stages of pregnancy. Why do strangers feel the need to comment on my growing body inappropriately?! Why do you feel that my round belly gives you the right to reach out and touch me?! Did I relinquish my human right to not be touched by strangers in public spaces?! Am I just a vessel now, an object to be handled?! I wanted to grow an aura of protection around my tired, heavy body. I wanted to be like a cactus and harm those who touched and violated my personal sacred space.
I have more examples from this series on my website if you are interested to see them. Thanks for looking!
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