ANTHROPOLOGY OF MOTHERHOOD
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ANTHROPOLOGY OF MOTHERHOOD

Image Description: Banner image is a detail of Laurie Shapiro’s art installation showing mystical ribbons of color, high contrast, flower, and leaf designs

 

ANTHROPOLOGY of MOTHERHOOD
Culture of Care

 
 

Celebrating its eighth year at the Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival, Anthropology of Motherhood (AoM) Culture of Care is pleased to bring you an art exhibition with a focus on Deaf and Disability culture and its synchronicity with the culture of care and maternal feminism.

The 2023 edition of AoM is presented in collaboration with the Dyer Arts Center at Rochester Institute of Technology’s National Technical Institute for the Deaf. This exhibition will travel to Dyer Arts Center in Rochester, NY and will be on view from August 28 – Dec. 8, 2023.

AoM's Feeding Room and gallery art exhibition will be in downtown Pittsburgh's Cultural District at 821 Penn Ave.  This will be a functional, hybrid exhibition that is innovatively designed as both an art space, an interactive amenity, and place of respite for families with young children.

The AoM public art installation will be close by at the Pittsburgh Cultural District’s Backyard space on 8th Street and Penn Ave. The Backyard is a summer-long destination that showcases local musicians, artists, and performers in a laid-back family-friendly environment. 

 

TABLE OF CONTENTS

  1. INFORMATION

  2. ARTISTS

  3. CURATOR’S INTRODUCTION

  4. ARTIST INDEX

  5. VIRTUAL GALLERY

  6. SPONSORS & PARTNERS

 
 

ARTISTS

 

Image Description: Banner image is a detail of Laurie Shapiro’s art installation showing mystical ribbons of color, high contrast, flower, and leaf designs

 
 

Introduction to the 2023 Exhibition

Image Description: Still from Anna Brody’s video piece. A sitting, naked white person with shoulder-length hair and eyes closed, holds their child who’s nestled into their side. Sunlight streams in from a window to the left.

The intersections of motherhood and disability are complex and multifaceted, encompassing a wide range of experiences and perspectives. According to disabilities studies scholar Kristen Lindgren, pregnancy, motherhood, and disability are connected in that they “involve the redrawing of bodily boundaries and incorporation of an other into the self. Both motherhood and [disability] require learning new ways to use my body and to interpret bodily signals.”

Mothers/parents who identify as disabled, and caregivers of disabled kin face unique challenges that are often overlooked or misunderstood by dominant culture, including barriers to healthcare, social isolation, and systemic discrimination. Despite these obstacles, mothers/parents who identify as disabled have also forged powerful communities of support and resistance, challenging dominant narratives about motherhood and disability and pushing for greater inclusivity and equity.

This year, Anthropology of Motherhood’s exhibition explores these intersections through a selection of artworks that offer diverse perspectives on the experiences of disabled artist/mothers and disabled artist/caregivers. These artworks highlight the ways in which disability shapes the experience of caregiving, parenting, and motherhood, while also challenging ableist assumptions and stereotypes. They draw attention to the complex realities of parenting with a disability, including joy, creativity, agency, and navigating systemic barriers.

Image description: Still from Nadia Naomi Mbonde’s video piece. We see a slanted, sillouetted landscape of trees against a starry blue night sky. In the foreground, we see a powerfully posed black woman with dark blue fabric billowing behind her. It almost looks like she’s holding or sending out a shooting star whose tail streams out to her outstretched hand.

Through a variety of media including photography, sculpture, performance, painting, and multimedia installations, these artworks explore themes such as the challenges of navigating healthcare systems, the intersections of disability and reproductive rights, and the emotional labor of mothering/parenting with a disability. They also offer insights into the rich networks of support and community that, in their solidarity, intervene in dominant narratives about motherhood and disability.

Together, these artworks provide a powerful testament to the creativity, labor, and profound relationships of reciprocal care engaged in by artists who identify as disabled mother/caregivers/parents, highlighting the importance of centering the intersectional experiences of motherhood and disability. The exhibition seeks to amplify the voices of these artists as a means to challenge ableist assumptions and design an equitable world for all mothers/caregivers/parents.

– Amy Bowman-McElhone, PhD, Curator

 
 

Artist Index

 
 

~ VIRTUAL GALLERY ~

We Are All Connected To Each Other Through Nature

This public art installation by Laurie Shapiro is currently on view in the Cultural District’s Backyard at 8th Street & Penn Ave., Pittsburgh, PA 15222, until June 11, 2023.

We Are All Connected To Each Other Through Nature, Laurie Shapiro, Installation of water based paints and screen printed drawings on vinyl over metal truss and handmade lighting, 12 x 18 x 12 ft, 2022

 

My progressive condition of deafness gives me no choice but to be in touch with my feelings, my emotions, and my internal world. I have always been connected and aware of myself in this way.  My life, and my art, have been significantly impacted by my experience of deafness. I build visually all-encompassing worlds and emotionally amplified paintings.  This exhibition at the Dyer Center for the Deaf is my “coming-out” as an artist with a condition of deafness, and presenting the work through my experience as a hard-of-hearing individual.

My work encompasses the sacred; I am heavily influenced by the natural world and spiritual experiences. As a mixed media artist, I employ a layering technique that combines painting, screenprinting, sewing, and sculpture to create installations and individual pieces. My installations are particularly transformative, creating otherworldly spaces that transport viewers into an imaginative world, reminiscent of Moroccan quilts or a psychedelic womb - like stepping into my mind.

To begin my process, I draw inspiration from plant life that I have encountered on my travels - visits to natural spaces like gardens and trails.  Since I’m often unphased by exterior noise, I really feel that I can listen to plants and capture some essence of them in my drawings.  These drawings then serve as the foundation for my screen- printable stencils, which I use to create repetitive patterns in my artwork. I then layer on colors through water-based painting, building up the surfaces of my pieces intuitively.

In addition, because of my hearing loss, my paintings take on an emotional amplification, overtly expressing feelings and gestures.  These pieces are usually narrative of my personal experience, and also use elements of the natural world, seeking to represent interconnectedness.  Colors are also amplified, as my visual world provides so much sensation and information. 

As an artist, I am interested in using my work and honest experience as a hard-of-hearing artist to highlight the connections that exist within and among each other and the natural world. 

 
 

Soundscapes in Motherhood

Jamie Walters Kessler

Soundscapes in Motherhood is a contemporary sound work and musical composition. The score for the musical composition Soundscapes in Motherhood was written and based on an EKG graph that charted the contractions and fetal and maternal heartbeats of the artist during childbirth. The live feedback from medical technologies during the time of active labor and childbirth was recorded and then translated into a musical composition. Soundscapes in Motherhood serves as a conceptual portrait of the artist’s son, and represents the capacity of human connection represented through a technological interface.

 

Soundscapes in Motherhood V.1 - Solo Harp Composition, Jamie Walters Kessler, Sound work, 1min 55sec, 2014

 

Soundscapes in Motherhood V.2 - Live Symphony Composition, Jamie Walters Kessler, Sound work, 8min 55sec, 2014

 
 
 

never let me down, Anna Brody, Video, 4 min 4 sec, 2021

never let me down

Anna Brody

My work in video and performance addresses love relationships of all intersecting kinds, and the internalized conceptions of maternal values that mediate them. I seek to dissolve the barrier between knowing something and feeling it, and I’m curious as to how aligning actions with words might begin to repair the disconnect often found there, and build trust in my own queer emotional future and the resilience of our collective heart. From this perspective, I engage in embodied inquiries of endurance, risk, and trust, looking to repetition in its capacity to create both comfort and tedium. In both performance and video I deal explicitly with the physical labor involved in communicating through mutual cooperation, and in creating new muscle memories in our hearts. It is my understanding that the drive to try anyway–to attempt to grow and hope and thrive together in community in the face of so many unknowns and so little control–is our species’ collective insanity and communal tenderness, and the only thing lighting our way into an uncertain future.

 

Emerging from the Raging Seas

My name is Arty Jen-Jo, I live in West Wales in the UK. I have been with Disability Arts Cymru (DAC) for over ten year but probably closer to fifteen years now. I started by doing paintings with using a head pointer but when COVID-19 struck in 2020, I moved onto photographs because I had nobody to help me to paint. That was our first DAC Arts prize. Then I decided to try out doing a video which lead me to winning the 2022 DAC arts Prize award. The work is a short film called “Emerging From The Raging Seas.” It tells you about about the experiences I have had throughout my life. The film was on my back lawn in early spring of 2021 and I wrote the script for it earlier this year. I had help in putting it all together in March By a DAC employee in March this year.

 

Emerging from the Raging Seas, Jenny-Joanna Bartholomew-Biggs, Video, 5 min 9 sec, 2023

  • This film which is called “Emerging from the Raging Seas” gives you a summary of the highs and lows I have to face. The person David who is in the film has been my main carer as well as my husband for over 30 years. I have also got a daughter and a granddaughter even though I am physically disabled and use a powered wheelchair all the time which is controlled by my head. I am still able to move my body being out of my wheelchair with assistance. To get myself heard I use a communication Aid which is also a computer. I have got a little white dot which is on my glasses so that I can operate the mouse. It is a great equipment which helps me to take part in everyday activities which most people would otherwise take for granted. One of the many activities I am doing is writing a book about various experiences I have had during my childhood and early adulthood. I also express myself through creative writing. I used performances and film as another Outlet. Oh yes, I nearly forgot to mention that I like teaching myself new songs either on my physical keyboard with a head pointer, or by going on an online piano I play by ear and have been since I was very young.

    [gentle piano music plays in the background throughout]

    Emerging from the Raging Seas All of my life I have been emerging from the Raging Seasbeing mistreated, treated well

    being manipulated and restricted not only by my disability cerebral palsy, but by life, people, situations that have been out of my control.

    Yet, during those raging waves of my early years until now, God, others, and my stubbornness and determination in the willingness to succeed, have been my foundations to live an independent life as much as possible.

    Despite being a woman, a wheelchair user, I was able to get married, make a family of my own, although the fight in my head still goes on.

    hidden deep down inside, dying to emerge from the depths of my soul, now I am in the middle of my life, doing what I can to survive this crazy world.

    As an independent woman of an able-bodied mind who has been cared for and always will be; also a wife a mother and now a grandmother.

 

An Astrological Diagnosis

In An Astrological Diagnosis, the filmmaker Nadia Naomi Mbonde embarks on a journey through the stars to make meaning of the psychosis she experienced during pregnancy. Providing an alternative perspective to the medical model, the narrative unfolds as Nadia converses with an astrologer while visually and sonically representing her otherworldly mental states through dance, self-portraiture, and etheric elements. Finally, the audience witnesses Nadia's process of integration through acts of mothering and self-care. The film's performative and experimental approach serves unsettle the notion that the camera or a psychiatric diagnosis can capture the expansive terrain of Black maternal madness.

An Astrological Diagnosis, Nadia Naomi Mbonde, Film, 6 min 16 sec, 2022

 
 

Pathology series, Frances Bukovsky

Lumen printing on silver gelatin paper

I make images about chronic illness, disability, and queerness and the relationships between selfhood, other beings and places, and medical experiences. My work uses a combination of self portraiture, documentary photography, and alternative processes so that I can explore my own dynamic experience of disability and gender identity from different perspectives. Alongside photography and print based images, I also create photobooks that weave together writing and photography to create vulnerable experiences for the reader. Common themes in my work include the relationship between privacy and disability, the burden of proof placed upon ill individuals when accessing accommodations and care, what care between people, places, and other beings may look like, and how larger systems create specific impacts in individual lives.

 
 
 

Aura #2, Aimee Bungard, Ink on paper, 12 x 16 in.

Black ink on white watercolor paper depicting a scotoma visual migraine aura, through seemingly abstract swirls and zigzags. 

Aura #2, Aimee Bungard

I inherited chronic migraine disease from my mothers side. In 2022 I contracted covid and my chronic migraine became dialy chronic intractable migraine. I've been unable to work most of 2022, and my art practice had to adjust due to my vision loss and numbness. I've been using my ink techniques to capture the auras I experience, the sensory disturbances and physical manifestations of this disability. Most people don't know migraine is a whole body disease affecting multiple body systems. I've experienced them since menarche and just this year am beginning to learn the breadth of this condition. It's my hope to bring attention to migraine, neurological disabilities and create a place of solidarity for my fellow migraneurs.

 
 

The PEony Bra, Alysa Miller

My work is an act of love towards myself, my body, and the unique bodies of everyone with Pectus Excavatum.

 

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.

 
 

Deaf Gain : Self Portrait, Ellen Mansfield

This painting is the Analogy in the present life. It is a metamorphosis of me and my daughters into the Dandelions. It has the meaning of Happiness, faithfulness and desire to have a full happiness in life. I am mother in the white fuzz flower seeds head that I have Deaf DNA and gave birth to 2 deaf daughters. I signed ASL words that they said “Deaf Gain”. It has been intertwined with dandelion stem. The stem goes down the ground for the root their deaf identity to baby with DNA motif.

This second analogy about the baby represent of myself in the ground and goes up with my growing up being deaf child to young adult.

Ellen’s past life in the background on paper. They showed the audism experiences in the 8 portraits in her circle.
1. The early drawing was just neutral work for school admission in 80’s, no revealed.
2. Early works to revealed about autism experiences of 2 etching works in art college days- and painting of “Barrier Communication” with my symbology of fence that I carried them to current works of included “Enough is Enough with ear molds” 2012, and ”Endless Summer” 2012
3. The works showed hearing aids with molds and banned ASL in education school
4. The works showed hearing aids with molds and banned ASL in education school
5. I developed symbolic images on the recent works. They are Fishes, question marks on ear, cross stitches as fences, chopped hands, ears, mouths, and eyes.

Deaf Gain : Self Portrait, Ellen Mansfield, Mixed Media with papers, oil pastels, pencils, acrylic paints, 40 x 30 in, 2014

 
 
 

Anonymous Portrait Nr. 15, Sean Alistair, Fibre Painting, 65 x 65 cm

In this painting there is a young man around the age of 30 with a kind face, cleanly brushed hair wearing a suit. He is holding a young boy in his arms who is obviously distracted by something else and looking away from the viewer. This mixed media painting was painted from a photograph from the 1950's or 60's after an important day at a church in Germany, however the artist omitted all the details of the background and is only showing the figures. The middle tone of the figures has been created purely by the unpainted light beige handwoven yet smooth linen fabric, the graphic shadows have been created by a flat black paint where as the highlights of the figures and half the background has been created by a layering of white, grey and light blue tweed fabric that has been embellished with embroidery and paillettes along the seams. The other half of the background has been painted a strong blue colour. 

Anonymous Portrait Nr. 15, Sean Alistair

A question that plagues my mind every day is if my love will be valid and enough for my child. My husband and I are currently on a journey to have our first child and create our little family, however the obstacles for us as gay people are insurmountable. We currently live in Germany but due to the fact Germany does not do surrogacy for gay men we must immigrate back to my home town in Canada were it is possible. The act of having a child can be is so easy for most of the world however for gay men who so badly want to nurture have a seemingly impossible journey in front of them. We both grew up with extremely strong and loving mothers, and we often talk about how we will be able to be nurturing enough for our child. I myself believe that we as humans have the capability to encapsulate both the masculine and feminine energies, however society does not. Anonymous Portraits is a series depicting the amazing stories of everyday life were I imagine who these people are and try to relate with them. With this particular painting I wanted to showcase a soft and feminine love shown from a man.

 
 
 
 
 

Evening Walk (1-3), Matthew Forrest

Silkscreen, 22 x 30 in.

The set of three offset lithographs and silkscreens features the afternoon walks my daughters, and I enjoyed in the late summer of 2022. During these adventures, we documented animals and plants we saw converting them in the silhouette, we even used imagery from books when looking up more details about the flora and fauna we encountered. The prints are multiply, layered each print containing between 15 and 25 overlapping images in a variety of colors. 

 
 
 
 

Sunrise, Sunset, PDurr, Collage: Gelliplate prints, acrylic paint, watercolor, and lipstick on canvas board, 16 x 20 in.

Sunrise, Sunset, Patti Durr

"Sunrise, Sunset" expresses the full circle mom and i are traveling - as my mom and my world she raised me to accept and love myself as a partially Deaf person - freely and easily repeating things for me all day everyday and now it is my as mom has Alzheimer's and repeats and needs repeating. Unconditional love is everlasting. Thank you to Anthropology of Motherhood for recognizing and promoting the importance of care and caring in societies.

I am our mom's primary caregiver. Mom came to live with us two weeks after COVID 19 broke out because she started to wander at her independent living setting as she could not understand or remember to stay in her apartment and her three meals would be delivered to her instead of going down to the communal dining room. I retired early so mom could stay with us and get the attention and care she deserves and while it has been a wild ride - I feel very blessed to have this time with her.

This work represents my relationship with my mother - the sunrise section shows my mother as her younger self and me as a young child - mom has dots on her hands (to show she used a lot of Italian gestures with me) and their are faint dots between mom and I to show how mom was the carrier of language - how she worked diligently to make sure I understood and was understood. As a partially Deaf child - I was often trying to understand what was happening around me and mom ensured that I always did when she was around. I have gold leaf on my chest area to show my heart to show I have her unconditional love.

The sunset portion shows me as an adult and mom as an elderly person with. I have dots on my hands and there are dots in between us to show how my signing helps mom as her Alzheimers progresses and she looses more and more of her spoken words. She has gold leaf on her chest to show how she has my unconditional love.

There are torn colorful fragments encircling us - for the cycle of life and some fait gold dots to show how we are all connected. The black corners represent the unknown.

 
 

My Brain on Motherhood

My work is deeply rooted in neurodivergence and my identity as an autistic mother. I often find verbal language to be inadequate and turn to imagery and metaphor to describe my lived experience. I dance between different mediums pulling from those that best express my inner landscape. My work encompasses traditional handcraft, which connects me to past generations, and emerging technologies, which tether me to the future. My art practice also plays an important social function by contributing to the growing neurodiversity movement.

— Sarah Shotts

 

My Brain on Motherhood, Sarah Shotts, Film, 24 sec, 2022

A flipbox sits on a white table. A white hand reaches into frame and turns the handle. Cards flip animating a child's corn popper toy. Colored balls pop into the air and fall back down repeatedly as the handle is turned. The hand stops and leaves the frame. The cards fall into a still image.

 
 
 

Lactation Anatomy Phoenix, Angela Starosta

This started out with the intent to express the beauty and complexity of the also super-functional and nurturing anatomy of lactation. But along the way, my kids have shattered it... Twice. And I've re-worked and re-assembled it twice. And if that isn't a perfect reflection of motherhood shifting and remaking us over and over as we go along, I'm really not sure what it is. So, it's a little extra gnarly and worse for the wear, but aren't we all? And it's still functional and nurturing and... Beautiful.

I am an autistic mother and primary caregiver to 3 autistic children. Bringing my kiddos earthside and caring for them has been medically complicated and fraught with trauma and invalidation by providers and required an awful lot of advocacy on my part. Unsurprisingly, childbirth, lactation, autism (and it's co-morbidities), and advocacy have become special interests of mine and are how I spend a great deal of my time. First and foremost as caregiver and primary advocate for my children, but also as a doula and IBCLC with Pittsburgh Birth Nerd. I've always been a "crafty" sort, but I began working with glass last summer (it was a mother's day gift!) And have been Loving exploring this medium and making birth things.

Lactation Anatomy Phoenix, Angela Starosta, Borosilicate glass, 12 x 12 x 8 in.

It is a dome-shaped glass object just shy of a cubic foot.  It is far from solid and contains very uneven, organic lines and the glass bears the marks of having been repaired and rebuilt.  From the side it is leggy and gangly, like a long-leg spider with 20ish clear legs, but those legs support the higher, central unit like the vaulted ceiling of a cathedral.  A few of the leg-like structures split like the stem of a cherry, which is particularly apt because at the bottom of each leg is a roundish object.  They are red and tan swirled tightly together.  The color-swirled glass is coiled to form a oblongish shape and speckled with clear dots.  From the top view, it resembles a flower-like shape.  It is topped with what is essentially an areola and nipple, constructed of tan and red glass swirled together.  It is the lactation anatomy of a breast.  

 
 
 

Untitled, Avianna Miller, Photography, 2D Print, 24 x 18 in.

A woman holds a glass pitcher of water over her hand, which is held open above a glass bowl on a beige table. Her face and shoulders are obscured by a diagonal shadow across the image. There are lit red and blue shabbat candles to the left on the table, a wine glass in the bottom left, and a smaller glass bowl with water in it to the right. Shadows from the objects are projected across the table, pointing toward the right.

Untitled, Avianna Miller

I work within my home space to make photographs and videos; this is a meeting place for spiritual connections to my Judaism and a shifting relationship to the body. I explore pockets of natural light that appear in the spaces of my home, investigating abstracted segments of the body, namely hands, as they interact with objects and surfaces.

Sunlight is a guiding force in my work. Sunrise and sunset operate as markers of Jewish practice, and sunlight is also considered a source of healing within the Jewish tradition. I maintain a mental record of intriguing moments of sunlight in the home that I track throughout the cycle of each day. I make my work in the early morning and the evening, observing the shifting light source of these points of the day. I am interested in interactions between these moments of light and objects that invoke ritualistic ideas for me. These ideas embody my Jewish identity through the material form of traditional Judaica and objects that hold an implicit Jewishness.

My subject matter concerns intersections of my identity as I work to interpret them through studies of the material that give visual form to notions of spiritual clearing and renewal. Elements of the body, especially limbs, have become important to my work as I seek to understand a shifting body as a chronically ill person. I aim to investigate ideas of a spiritual relationship to the body; hands in gesture, interacting with objects found in my home, reinforce connections to person, place, and action. At other times in my work, a human presence is suggested, leaving behind a trace of a body in space.

I work collaboratively with my mother to imagine ritual spaces built upon generations of tradition. These staged spaces explore ritual as a grounded yet abstract personal practice that can be made material through reinterpretations of objects and acts. In what is revealed and what is hidden in my work, I consider that which can become visible within the ritual of making.

 
 
 
 

Guadalupe, Melissa Skyer

My daughter, Melissa Skyer created the Guadalupe mosaic. It took her two years to complete this project before she passed away from aggressive brain tumors. She often prayed to Guadalupe hoping for a cure which sadly did not happen.

On the back of her mosaic Melissa wrote: “And from the infinite darkness you came...”  I interpret that to mean Guadalupe came to take Melissa home to be with her dad and paternal aunts.

— Solange Skyer

Guadalupe, Melissa Skyer, Mosaic, 22 x 30 in, 2020

 
 
 

Ταπήτιον/Tapestry, iele paloumpis

The piece on display is one small section of the larger tapestry, which measures 30 ft. x 10 ft. 4 in. paloumpis’s commitment to hand embroidering a piece of this scale is purposefully ambitious. In undertaking a work that can only be completed in decades, if ever, the artist defiantly asserts their intention to live a long life against the odds that they face as a trans person with a neurodegenerative condition in the time of COVID-19. Exhibiting this work at various stages of development resists pressures of ableist capitalist perfectionism and invites audiences to witness the time and care of undervalued & “feminized” labor. Anything left unfinished is a reminder of the finiteness of our time on this planet.

I conceive of my textile work as an extension of my movement/dance practice. The first time I picked up an embroidery needle and thread, my body just knew what to do. I believe this somatic-knowing comes through epigenetics or blood memory, as embroidery has a long history of practice in my Greek and Anatolian bloodlines. I stitch to re-member cultural inheritances seemingly lost through forced displacement and familial trauma, but have come to understand that these wisdoms live on inside my hands. I also connect my somatic textile practice to a form of “crip”-artistry and embodiment - as my body changes through progressive disabilities, I have had to reimagine my relationship to dance and movement over and over again. Right now, textiles offer one of the deepest and sustainable pathways toward connection in my body - it is a movement practice, reaching backward and forward in time, allowing me to dance through needles, threads, weavings, and lacework.

Creating such a large-scale piece of hand-embroidery will be a life-long endeavor for me as a disabled artist, serving as a timeline of sorts, with the intention to live a long life against all odds – especially as someone with a progressive neurodegenerative condition in the time of COVID-19. When my mobility becomes too impaired to continue the piece on my own, the work will continue by inviting audience members to stitch τάματα (leaf-shaped votive offerings) into the canopy of the Tree of Life, as prayers for the Earth. Anything left “unfinished” will be a reminder of the finiteness of our time on this planet. As I grapple with the continued loss of my mobility and ultimately my mortality, I feel called to create work that is material and tactile, something to be left behind, to tell the stories that need to be told.

Ταπήτιον/Tapestry, iele paloumpis, Jute fabric, cotton embroidery thread, and recycled clothing scraps, Dimensions variable, 2021-Present

A tapestry hangs on the wall. The jute fabric is light brown and similar to the texture of burlap. Draped over the top of the tapestry is a circular weaving, braided together with recycled scraps of clothing in brilliant reds, pinks, and orange tones. The jute tapestry measures 45 in tall x 32 in wide, and toward the bottom of the fabric is a wide band of hand-stitched embroidery. The embroidered motifs are Peloponnesian and the geometric symbols often adorn the sleeves of brides, whom upon their death, would be buried in these garments. Vibrant red triangles are interspersed with gradient accent colors, reminiscent of a sunrise to evoke the artist’s ancestral home in Cappadocia, Anatolia, as the name “Anatolia” comes from the Greek word for sunrise. The bottom of the tapestry unravels into jute fringe. Positioned on the floor underneath the tapestry hanging on the wall, are textile materials that on-site attendees are invited to touch and interact with. These include: Long, colorful, braided ropes coiled into bundles, sculptural roses made from the jute fabric, and another circular weaving made from recycled clothing, similarly brightly colored in red, purple, pink, and orange tones.

 
 

KIGALI DEAF ART GALLERY

 

The Kigali Deaf Art Gallery operates in Kigali and employs 13 disabled youths (including 6 girls). They make beaded pots, paintings, drawings, mural paintings and sculptures. They also make jewelry ornaments, multimedia and fashion, among other things. The art gallery is meant to help persons with disabilities who have different challenges, especially the deaf.

  • Born deaf in Rubavu district, Western Rwanda, Prince Nahimana beat all odds to get education and picked interest in Art, which he pursued to graduate with a bachelors Art and industrial design in Uganda.

    Nahimana participated at the International Day of Persons with Disabilities (IDPD) celebrations on December 7, 2022 at the University of Kigali, Rwamagana Campus. The day was marked with activities like songs, poems, and dances, and performances by youth with disabilities to showcase their talents.

    The youth at this event indicated that disability is inability and Nahimana is a good example. Four years ago, he returned home and founded the Kigali Deaf Art Gallery.

    “I started the gallery so as to show that disabled persons have talents,” Nahimana said.

    Nahimana who was among the finalists in the 2022 Art Ubuhanzi competition (organized by Imbuto Foundation) says that they have plans to operate countrywide and train disabled persons in arts, painting and sign language translation skills which can help the members market and sell their products.

    “I wanted to reach out to other people living with disabilities and help them find employment, and in turn reduce the high level of unemployment among the deaf through creating jobs,” he says.

    Every school’s holiday, the gallery conducts training for students but Nahimana says that the number of children attending are few because parents are reluctant to send them.

    “There are many parents who use disabled children for begging, but my plan is to seek fund and work with the government to set up a training center for children with disabilities and their parents so that they can earn from their talents,” Nahimana said.

    The IDPD day is usually observed on December 3, and this year’s theme was “Transformative Solutions for Inclusive Development: The role of innovations in fueling an accessible and equitable world.”

    Such solutions hail from projects like Cooperative 30 deaf women in Nyamirambo sector in Kigali, a fashion business which makes made in Rwanda clothing and jewelry but also runs a deaf women’s dance troupe.

    Françoise Uwikunda, the cooperative coordinator says that the initiative has allowed members to come out of isolation to be able to earn income, show their talents through dance, but access information.

    We don’t only make money but also during dance practices, our members can access information on reproductive health and keep it with current trends instead of staying home,” Uwikunda said.

    Juru Initiative- a student-led organization that works to address different challenges that young people with disabilities in Rwanda are implementing the Special Needs and Inclusive Education (SNE) policy to ensure that all children and youth including those with disabilities have access to equitable, inclusive, and quality education.

    Justin Ruhumuriza, a medical student and founder of Juru Initiative says that through the ‘Impano challenge’they help children with disabilities expose their talents in a way of raising self-confidence among them through inclusive education and create income generating projects.

    Through its advocacy and working with districts, the initiative provides menstrual pad to 500 girls with disabilities and employment for over 50 youth graduates.

    UNICEF Representative in Rwanda, Julianna Lindsay says persons with disabilities just need some support and acknowledgement to bring out their talents but the country and economy can miss out on possibilities and scientific discoveries if persons with disabilities are not given an opportunity to express themselves in many talents and genius.

    “The talents displayed here demonstrate that their ability overrides their disability. All they need from us is a bit of support and space to meet their needs holistically, and we’ve been helping and will continue to,” Lindsay said.

    - Daniel Sabiiti. “KIGALI DEAF ART GALLERY: PEOPLE WITH DISABILITY EXPRESS THEMSELVES.” KT Press, December 12, 2022. Accessed April 29, 2023.

  • Follow and Support @KigaliDeafArt

  • Kigali Deaf Art Gallery Video

 
 

 Kindling Series, Annie B. Campbell

 

My work examines disconnections between humans and nature in the Anthropocene and society’s artificial constructs that allow us to perceive ourselves as separate from nature. Using clay, organic materials, and mixed sculpture media, I have developed a visual vocabulary that speaks to environmental disasters and expresses our collective fragility in the face of climate change.

In 2017 my infant son was diagnosed with a rare neurological condition that caused catastrophic epilepsy. The only treatment for this life-threatening condition was a complete surgical disconnection of the two hemispheres of his brain. This traumatic experience was the catalyst for the injection of neurology into my work. What I learned while researching neuronal pathways, seizures, neuroplasticity, and different types of brain cells resonated with my long-held passion for exploring the human/nature disconnect. Additionally, my son’s surgical incision led me to explore stitching as a visual metaphor. I stitch with silk suture thread, steel wire, conductive thread, and rusted wire to symbolize a repetitive, reparative act in the midst of feeling helpless when faced with overwhelming danger. The neuronal forms, which are malformed, damaged and deteriorating, symbolize society’s dysfunctional relationship with nature. The light patterns from LED lights inserted into translucent porcelain forms represent seizure activity in the brain. Their dangerous and damaging irregular misfirings are representative of the collective cognitive dissonance perpetuated by humanity as it continually harms our natural world in ways that will lead to its inevitable destruction.

Plant structures mimic our circulatory and respiratory systems. The miles of “information super-highway” that exist amongst tree roots in the form of mycelium fungal networks operate similarly to neuronal synaptic systems. By dipping botanical elements into liquid porcelain and firing out the organic material, the resulting hollow structures are akin to eggshells, bones, and fossils. The extreme fragility of these forms conceptually links the work to our precarious position in time. Without significant public policy change, in less than 20 years, we will reach the “point of no return” regarding carbon emissions. The work is successful when viewers come away with a heightened sense of the precipice upon which we waver. To consider ourselves separate from the biosphere we inhabit is a tenuous fallacy perpetuated by those who stand to profit from this collective delusion.

To direct my practice, I ask myself if this work is an act of visual persuasion or protest; to what extent am I interested in affecting my audience’s opinions and beliefs on the climate crisis? Or is it self-expression in the form of synthesizing terrifying statistics into objects of beauty as a psychological survival mechanism? The answer is that the work is simultaneously didactic and cathartic. It is in dialogue with the ongoing societal discourse around environmental destruction, and it is designed to inspire self-reflection and a realization of personal responsibility.

 Kindling Series, Annie B. Campbell, Ceramics, 4 x 54 x 3 in.

The neurological references in my work are influenced by my son's rare brain malformation. Overall my work speaks to the climate crisis and disconnection from the natural world.

 

Postpartum Document, Laural Hartman

A screen print featuring three loaves of bread undergoing the process of decay. Aligned neatly in a row, the loaves gradually display signs of decomposition as time passes. Set against a backdrop of varying shades of white, the background subtly accentuates the stark contrast between the fresh and decaying bread.

A postpartum journey as a deaf mother, wife, and artist.

As a painter and printmaker, I am constantly exploring the concept of incidental learning and how it has shaped my perception of the world around me. Incidental learning is the unintentional learning that occurs when we observe and absorb information without consciously trying to do so. For me, this has been a crucial aspect of my development as an artist.

Growing up deaf, I was always acutely aware of my surroundings and had to rely heavily on my visual sense. This heightened awareness of my environment has greatly influenced my artistic style and subject matter. My paintings and prints often feature physical ephemera, photographs, and objects, capturing the beauty in the mundane and overlooked. I aim to communicate the unique perspective and insights that come from living in a world where sound is not a primary source of information.

Postpartum Document. Laural Hartman, Monoprint, 16 x 53 in.

A screen print featuring three loaves of bread undergoing the process of decay. Aligned neatly in a row, the loaves gradually display signs of decomposition as time passes. Set against a backdrop of varying shades of white, the background subtly accentuates the stark contrast between the fresh and decaying bread.

 
 

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