By collaborating with mothers through interviews and shared paintings, I wish to showcase motherhood's invisible and visible labor to a larger audience. The final paintings will begin with the interviewee painting the background, and I will paint, in collaboration with the mother, a visual representation of their experiences in the foreground. The paintings, paired with the interviews, will be shared with local mothers groups to discuss motherhood’s visible and invisible labor.
Project Description
For this project, I will collaborate with mothers to create a shared piece representing their journey as a mother and their feelings about visible and invisible labor, or cognitive labor. “Cognitive labor is ubiquitous in modern households. No meal is made, no dentist appointment scheduled, and no daycare center selected without some amount of foresight, planning, and deciding.” (Damager 2019: 610) A central theme in my artwork is the mental health troubles we experience as mothers. I’ve found that the more I share my experiences with others and hear their stories, the less overwhelmed I feel. This is supported by many psychology studies such as The Incremental Validity of Narrative Identity in Predicting Well-Being: A Review of the Field and Recommendations for the Future by Jonathan M Adler, Jennifer Lodi-Smith, Frederick L Philippe, and Iliane Houle. Dr. Annie Brewster shares her insight into the matter in her article Stories Connect Us, saying, “When we witness someone else's vulnerability in a safe and supportive environment, we feel less alone, and often just plain better.” (Brewster 2021) This research was the inspiration behind this project. I will interview individuals about motherhood and visible vs invisible labor. Then, we will work together to create a collaborative painting telling their story. During the interview, I will explain the psychology of color, line, and shape. I will guide the mother in painting the background to represent their feelings and thoughts as I interview them. Some example questions for the interview:
How do you manage the emotional well-being of your family members, including your children and yourself?
How do you anticipate your family members' needs before they arise?
How does your ability to predict and meet emotional and practical needs contribute to the family dynamic?
How do you manage the mental load associated with keeping track of various tasks, schedules, and responsibilities?
With permission from the mother, I will record the interview to pair with the paintings in an exhibition and share them on my website/social media platforms. In the next stage, I’ll use their response to draw, paint, and embroider over the background they created. I will use the background textures, shapes, colors, and movement to guide my style and placement when illustrating their story. Additionally, I will also ask the mother for photos of their journey to use as a reference. Many mothers I will be collaborating with do not identify as artists. I will offer the opportunity to paint portions of the overlaying design to their comfort level. My collaborators will begin with my close group of mom friends, with whom I will set up individual sessions in the coming weeks. I want to start this project with those closest to me as it will help me be comfortable in the early stages of working with others. From there, I will connect with mother support groups to present the works so far and some snippets of the interviews to lead a discussion around the invisible labors in motherhood. From there, I hope to connect with more mothers who wish to become collaborators. In the final stages, most likely after the end of this course. I hope to put on a show with all the different paintings and the mother's words or interviews alongside their painting.
Outcomes Each mother will be a collaborator for an individual 16" x 20" painting. Through these paintings, I hope to share their motherhood stories, feelings, and experiences dealing with the visible and invisible labor of being a mother. Bright Horizons 2017 Index Study found that “women are two times more likely to be managing the household and three times more likely to be managing children’s schedules. More than just responsible for their half of the parenting and household duties, these working mothers are also organizing, reminding, and planning everything else.” (2017: 2) For me, one of the most important purposes of art is to communicate with others, help them feel seen, and show them that we are not alone in our experiences. By translating these mothers' experiences into a visual representation, I will communicate to the audience the amount of work involved with being a mother. I hope they will also inspire communications within families to begin sharing those burdens equally with their partners. A final aspect that excites me about this collaboration is giving people who do not identify as artists a hand in an artwork that tells their story, giving them the support and access to see themselves as an artist.
Future Impact The possibilities for future project developments have inspired me so much. There are several avenues I would like to pursue. First, I will continue the interview painting sessions. I want to widen the demographic and mothering experience of my collaborators. My original group consisted mainly of white, middle-class, married couples with children under 10. Some groups I would like to interview are widows, single mothers, mothers who have lost a child, mothers of older children, and grandmothers. I will also focus on representing mothers from different ethnicities and socioeconomic classes in all these groups. Secondly, I want to publish a book of the paintings and stories together. I am excited about the possibility of spreading these stories to an even broader audience. I will need to reconnect with the original mothers interviewed and have them complete forms for permission to publish their paintings and stories. I will also collaborate with an author, as I need more expertise to do the stories justice in written form. I would also like to collaborate with a researcher in mental health support, specifically focusing on shared stories to deepen the book's understanding and impact. To assist my future collaborators, I took detailed notes, recorded the interview, and wrote a summary for the public-facing outcome that the author could use to help them write these beautiful stories. Another layer I might pursue in the book is combining works from past and present artists alongside my mother's stories and paintings. Ann Coxen's book Motherhood is an excellent example of the representation of mothers in art over time. Interested in becoming one of my collaborators? I will begin the next set of interviews in June, in the meantime you can fill out this Interviewee Questionnaire for Scheduling and I will reach out to you in May.