Image: Zoe Freney, Postcard from Close to Home #3, 2020, pen on paper postcard, 152 x 132mm (Photographer: Chloe Metcalfe)
October 6 – 30, 2020
Bridget Currie, Louise Flaherty, Zoe Freney, Rochelle Haley, Alana Hunt, Tania Mason and Tanya Voges
Postcards from Motherhood is a group exhibition and community engagement project curated by multidisciplinary artist Tanya Voges. The exhibition features work by artists who are also mothers: Bridget Currie, Zoe Freney, Rochelle Haley, Alana Hunt, Tania Mason andTanya Voges.
Postcards from Motherhood centres Mother Artists who continue to practice in the arts alongside their commitments to their families. The exhibition responds to the idea of sending a postcard from within the time and space of motherhood. Presenting paintings, drawings, textile works, photographic, film, performance and community contributions of postcards-as-artwork. Sent from around the world, these postcards connect local audiences to a community of mothers working across the globe. Postcards from Motherhood will be accompanied by a series of public programs which allow parents to participate as part of a rigorous arts community.
This project is presented as part of The Mill’s new program CaM-Res (Curatorial and Mentorship Residency) presented in partnership with City of Adelaide. In August Tanya Voges began a twelve week studio residency at The Mill, during which she has been developing this exhibition, collaborating with The Mill Studio resident Louise Flaherty and undertaking mentorship with The Mill’s staff. Tanya is stepping into a curatorial role for the first time, in an act that she refers to as ‘choreographing an exhibition’.
Curatorial statement:
‘Wish you were here…’
A postcard is sent from a place you visit, not the place you normally inhabit.
For this exhibition I’ve invited mothers who are practicing artists throughout the early years of motherhood to create work about the process and time of life we are in. The resulting works across a broad spectrum of mediums are influenced by inhabiting motherhood, yet not prescriptively about the act of mothering. This exhibition embraces the connections that these artists have to their families and because of that focus on creating life, respects that there is multiplicity at play in their practice.
Through curating this exhibition I aim to create an exemplary process practice modelled on the movement for Mother Artists that is taking place throughout the world. The model of an Artist Residency in Motherhood that Lenka Clayton detailed as an open source model has given me an anchor to my changing practice at a time where my life is in flux. Developing a supported studio practice with integrated childcare and arts spaces that welcome children has become part of my process as I recognise the need for my community, inspired by the Mother House model in London. My focus is on caring for more than just my own wellbeing, and the importance I feel to be an example for the next generation, so that we can stay engaged in meaningful work and connected to a broad community, while being a mother.
Mothers should be supported. There is a profound need in society of understanding what motherhood means, the invisible unpaid labour of caring for a child and raise him or her into an adult in this society should be evaluated and recognised and not ignored…Starting from this awareness then we can try to create more infrastructures that facilitate a woman in pursuing her career while nurturing her practice as a mother.– Dyana Gravina (Procreate and Mother House)
Call for Contributions
In the lead up to the exhibition Tanya invites mothers to contribute postcard sized works. Imagined as a way of capturing a moment from the time and place of motherhood, send us a postcard that speaks to some aspect of your experience of being a parent. Use an existing postcard and modify it, use either side of the paper, or create something out of other materials that is 4”x6”/A6. This modest size has been selected as it is manageable, small and fits between all of your other commitments.
Please send postcards to:
ATTN Tanya Voges
C/o The Mill,
154 Angas Street,
Kaurna Yarta
Adelaide 5000
About the Program
Tanya Voges is The Mill’s inaugural CaM-Res artist. She has begun a twelve week studio residency at The Mill as part of a new program, CaM-Res (Curatorial and Mentorship Residency), presented in partnership with City of Adelaide.
This exhibition is presented in partnership with City of Adelaide, Fostering a city of makers