ALYSA MILLER
Four bras, three are purple, one is yellow with a small white floral pattern. The first three bras are experiments, while the fourth is the finished, working prototype. All have tags describing the order they were made in, what was tried, and what worked or didn't work about the design. The final bra is purple with black lace accents and trim, and black straps. There is a thermoplastic underwire inside that has been molded to fit the artist's chest. There is an extra set of black straps at the center of the bra to prevent the underwire from tipping forward when worn.
The PEony Bra, Alysa Miller, Fabric, wire, thermoplastic, timelapse video, 2023
A time-lapse video shows the process of assembling and sewing the PEony bra, cutting the underwires out of a sheet of thermoplastic, molding the underwire to the artist's ribcage, inserting the underwire into the bra, and making adjustments with a heat gun to perfect the fit. The artist is a red-haired woman in a grey shirt.
There are two diagrams, one showing the difference between a normal ribcage and a ribcage with Pectus Excavatum, and how these differences affect bra fit. Three images of normal ribcages with bras are mirrored by three images of ribcages with PE lined up underneath, with notations describing how normal bras don't fit the unique topography of PE. For a normal ribcage "The gore (center) sits flush on the sternum, the band stays even, and the breasts stay encapsulated." For PE ribs, "The gore floats over the sternum, the band rides up, and the cups gap and breasts fall out at bottom center." The second diagram shows a PE ribcage at two different angles, showing how the underwire and sports bra versions of the PEony bra solve the issues described in the first diagram. "A 'W' shaped thermoplastic underwire molds to your unique shape, and holds the gore to the sternum!" And for the sports bra: "Changing the proportions of the band and front panel prevents the band from shifting around!"
Pectus Excavatum is an overgrowth of the rib cartilage that causes the sternum to dip inwards. It is the most common chest wall deformity, with an incidence of 1 in 400. Despite its prevalence, difficulty finding good bras is a universal experience among women with PE. The backs ride up and the gores stretch over our sunken chests, so our breasts just fall down through the gap. We try custom made bras, expensive adjustable styles, and professional measuring. We even bend our underwires in an attempt to make them conform better to our rib cages, to no avail.
When it became clear that surgical correction was not an option for me because of an underlying connective tissue disorder, I learned everything I could about bras out of necessity. The majority of the support from a bra is supposed to come from the band. The band can only support the breasts if it's touching the torso all the way around, which it can’t do on a chest with a big divot in the middle. The gore will always float above the concavity, so the breasts will always fall and push the gore out until the bra is just a useless tube of fabric. I needed a way to fit the underwire to me, instead of expecting my chest to conform to a standardized bra.
I made a “W” shape out of an old wire hanger and bent it by hand to match the shape of my chest. It was slow and clumsy, but it proved the soundness of my idea. Every person’s deformity is completely unique, so I needed to find a material that would be easier to customize. While in physical therapy for my wrist, I was amazed at how easily my therapist made custom braces right in the office out of thermoplastics. There was the key – a material that could be molded to shape with only heat.
I am pursuing this project as an act of care for myself and the greater Pectus Excavatum community. As anyone with a chronic illness or condition knows, the most useful information rarely comes from doctors. It comes from engaging with fellow patients, and drawing on the collective knowledge of the community. When standard options cannot help you, helping each other becomes imperative. I think this approach is what will ultimately change society for the better: rebuilding networks of support and community through millions of small, mundane acts of care. We need to take responsibility for each other's well being and mold the solutions to the problems, as it becomes more and more clear that our current standardized solutions are inadequate.
Alysa Miller is a multidisciplinary artist who has been creating since childhood, first painting and sewing alongside her grandparents. Following the path of her curiosity wherever it leads, she has continued to gather skills in many different mediums, including drawing, crochet, embroidery, paper-craft, and collage. Most recently she apprenticed at Sunset Clay studio in her native Lansing, Michigan, where she hand-builds and sculpts.
Alysa's most constant inspiration is the intricate, manifold complexity of the human body. Disabled from a young age by a connective tissue disorder (Hypermobile Ehlers Danlos Syndrome) and a chest wall deformity (Pectus Excavatum), she learned to develop an intimate relationship with her body and its subtle signals and idiosyncratic workings. This awareness allows her to manage her complex chronic illness. It informs her artwork, which most often features anatomical imagery. For her, every new skill and project serves as a way to further explore embodiment. She wants to use her experiences as a chronically ill person in the US's for-profit healthcare system to help develop practical ways to change our current approach to medicine. The goal of her work is to rehumanize and decommodify us all, patients and providers alike.
She is currently breaking into digital creation with a collection of fabric designs based around the Tarot. She is also working on a series of sculptures and assemblages made from medical supplies gathered over her many years of doctor's appointments. She plans to display them through U of M's art exchange program at one of the very hospitals where she received treatment, creating a dialogue with healthcare providers, patients, and community members.
Alysa is presently developing and launching PEony: a collection of customizable bras designed for people with Pectus Excavatum like herself, who struggle to find useful off-the-rack options.