(hi CH I have added your comment as a post – to make it more visible, LP )
Have finally got round to writing something here. Sorry it’s a year later than I’d hoped, but I suppose I’m a year behind you in having a baby and getting back to work. My daughter Thea is now just over one and I, too, am paying for a childminder and having to justify to myself why it’s OK that I’m not ‘At [money] Work’ today. But I feel so much better for some thought time.
Haven’t yet started making art post-baby, so these are some initial thoughts as I’m trying to rekindle my artistic practice…
I have really enjoyed my time at home with my baby. I like children and have always known that I would like to have them. However I have not found it easy to reconcile the ‘artist’ and the ‘mother’ in me, as the two all-consuming processes are often at loggerheads.
I have often photographed myself at times of change. These have generally been private photographs – though one set of photos turned into a piece of artwork – ‘Internal Reflection’ (1998). In any of my self-portraits my viewpoint is the point, the camera and myself are both visible. I am both the subject and the means of the photograph.
I also had plans for a photographs that I would take when expecting a baby. This involved photographing my expanding tummy on a regular basis and charting the disappearance of my feet. However, when it came to it, it did not feel right to go ahead in the way I had always thought I would..
My pregnancy was unplanned (though welcome) so there wasn’t a ‘before’ and ‘after’ – a point at which I could start photographing. Somehow, when it came to it, the process of being pregnant was far more organic than I had been expecting. Well, I suppose it was the difference between seeing a pregnant tummy as an object, rather than part of me.
I did take a few photographs but couldn’t impose an unnatural [daily? weekly?] rhythm on when to take them, so life went by and my tummy grew largely undocumented. This caused a ridiculous situation as I was getting ready to go into hospital – the quest to take one last photograph of my stomach became part of my temporary labour-induced madness. In moments between contractions, my focus shifted back to framing the photograph consistently with other images and how to stop the flash bouncing off my stomach, before the next wave of pain stopped me in my tracks again. In the end I gave up – I have some photographs taken that night, but I wouldn’t exhibit them! I had also planned to take some photos of my new baby and me, to complete the set. Again, life and the demands of a new baby took priority. I missed the ‘newborn’ look I had in my mind’s eye and the series remains unfinished. And, as many an artist knows, work often goes through a really cringey stage when you’re not sure what it is or whether it’s worth pursuing. That’s where it is at the moment.
I suppose what I have so far are ’sketches’. In order to be able to work further on the idea, I will have to have another baby which is a much more serious undertaking than making a finished piece of art normally demands. Also in doing so, I will have even less time to make art. Of course, I could fake it. But that’s not the point. So perhaps I am trying to make an impossible piece of art.
I suppose that’s why making art takes on a whole new dimension once a baby is in your life. How could it not change? I have found it really difficult to make art with Thea around. She was very good at being around at ‘Open Studios’ but my attempts at studio work (while she sleeps) have been so far unsuccessful. There is a need for me to find another means of expression which requires less time than I have been used to. Some thoughts to get around this include making work at home while she sleeps, making drawings and seeing how far I get before she makes me stop, featuring her in my work. All of these ideas are rife with potential cliche. But I suppose lots of ideas are, until they are made not to be.
Of course I could ignore the the fact I’ve had a baby, but it impacts on every aspect of my life – from the amount of free time I have, friends I get to see, the number of things I do, the time I go to bed, paying for childcare, what I wear….
So it’s inevitable that if I am to continue making artwork it will be changed.
As you can tell, I have been thinking about this subject for some time but this is all I can write for now. My time is nearly up with the childminder for today.
Any ideas, strategies, solutions, magic wands are welcome.
February 11, 2009 at 2:45 pm |
There are a large number of moments in your writing that I recognise. I was dumbfounded by the lack of photos I produced – when in my mind, I had the pose, lighting, props even the scale/framing and title of the final image sorted. I absolutely ignored my pregnant image but the ideas brewed and formed a list of things to do.
I think I was terrified of there being no baby at the end of the pregnancy and I had immortalised & publicised & started a discussion on something that had a unwanted outcome.
There are still images that I want and I don’t have the same concerns about truth/faking as I am not a documentary photographer – my work is constructed- though I hope that my fears & vanity won’t stop me next time round.
I struggle with the snapshot and the everyday photograph but being a mother is making me more frivolous with taking & collecting images which is totally odds with my artist practice.
Atli is now 2 and his starting nursery & a regular babysitter is just beginning to impact on my productivity. This is 3rd week of me having TIME,
first week = right off as I was worrying if he was ok
second week = he was off nursery ill
third week = I’ve done one funding application & submitted work for one commission and for consideration for one exhibition.
A bonus is the guilt I felt of being on my own (not money working or mum’ing) has pretty much shifted and I am enjoying getting organised. Now the making…
Haven’t quite worked out how to make work yet – but it does still involve moments when he is asleep but also visibly excluding/removing him from the image, recording our battles for the camera and other work that can sound cringey because its female, domestic, political, unwanted, deemed to be a visual moan rather than a pertinent examination and questioning of power plays, shifts in control and the frustrations of being misunderstood.
I have always been deadline motivated and worked in bursts, and havent yet managed to ever get a studio – though I have been a regular student and have had the support of technicians & peers & tutors.
The artist and the mother, feels more like an administrator at the moment. Where are the child friendly residencies? and can you put child care down in a budget or is that an invisible absorbed cost.