Creating a Space for Learning and Meaningful Exchange
People often ask Future Mothers how and why we work together and how our prints are made. These questions are usually followed by a comment on the challenges of collaboration. My answer is informed by my work/life experience as an educator and printmaker. My pedagogy and practice is shaped by a list of notable women artists, scholars, and activists. My list includes powerful women such as Nancy Spero, Louise Bourgeois, bell hooks, and Suzanne Lacey, among others. As a young art student, these women modeled lives of creative risk,meaning and lasting impact , and their work continues to present me with transformational ideas and values. One of the most important ideas from these artists that shape my teaching/making in the classroom and the studio is creating a space of learning and exchange based on listening, inclusion, and dialog. In her book Leaving Art, Suzanne Lacey writes, “within this paradigm getting people to talk with each other, and perhaps as a result think or act differently, is a critical role for artists, creating meaningful rituals of our civic life”. She continues in her book to discuss “the importance of revealing women’s experiences, ideas, and activities through art, and the use of art forms to generate situations where people would interact in human ways”. The work of Future Mothers strives to build this active space of learning and continue this legacy of inclusion, listening, and dialog. In the print shop, in the classroom , or in the Future Mothers Tent, our work is made with, by, and for others to create liberatory spaces and meaningful exchange.
