Feminist Artist, and the Pregnant Body as a symbol of Femininity and Feminism - Blooming Body

In the context of exploring the blooming body as a metaphor for pregnancy, and the transformation of the body, and also in relation to feminism art, I decided to explore pregnancy as a representation for maternity, femininity, and feminism in the works of important feminists artists. The research I collected inspired me in my design process, especially in the form and shape exploration as well as volumes and texture in my textile exploration, but it is also a very important piece of my theoretical research.

Judy Chicago:

"Chicago’s images demonstrate a psychological shift within women in Western culture. They afford a vision seldom seen since the Neolithic, when woman embodied creation. Chicago’s images, however, transcend visual resurrection. Together they extol women’s will to self-power on an expansive scale, their will to create and self-create, and their ability to celebrate themselves for that creation. In the Birth Project women birth themselves; they birth the universe and its contents; they birth and care for children. Chicago’s images expose the physical and real but also reveal birth as spiritual and intellectual, a source of myth and symbol."

--> linking to my research on Gaia, women as creators, powerfull, birthing the universe

Niki de Saint Phalle:

"The exhibition ”She – A Cathedral” consisted of a giant sculpture, a “cathedral” (23 m wide and 6 m tall) in the form of a pregnant woman lying on her back, which the audience could enter. Inside, visitors encountered an aquarium full of goldfish, a two-seated sofa for lovers, a bar, an exhibition with paintings, a small cinema that showed a Greta Garbo movie, a slide for kids, and many other surprises.

Niki de Saint Phalle created her Nanas in various shapes and sizes from 1964 onwards. The inspiration for these works came from her friend Clarice Rivers, who was pregnant at the time. The Nanas bear witness to Saint Phalle’s belief in the divine nature of women and are frequently taken to represent a feminist perspective in her art"

--> the divine, the femininity, pregnancy, feminist work

Louise Bourgeois:

"This article explores late works by contemporary artist Louise Bourgeois that illuminate current concerns about ageing maternal bodies and the ambivalent responses of fear and loathing that they provoke. In 2003, Louise Bourgeois made an installation for the Freud Museum in Vienna entitled The Reticent Child, on the subject of her own earlier pregnancy and birth of her son, one of several works featuring maternity and fertility which Bourgeois has created in old age. In Nature Study 2007, made at the age of 96 years, she depicts carnal couples and pregnant and birthing figures embodied in brilliant pinks and scarlet reds. Bourgeois represents women as the powerful agents of the maternal function, marking a return to motherhood as a central topic of her earlier work."

Sources:

Jenny Saville - Umbilical 2011 (Bridgeman Education) :

Bridgeman Education (oclc.org)

Niki de Saint Phalle, Jean Tinguely - She - A Cathedral, Moderna Museum, 1966 (installation and sketch) : +quote

Remembering She – A Cathedral | Moderna Museet i Stockholm

Judy Chicago - Birth Tear/Tear from the Birth Project, 1985. Macramé over drawing on fabric.: + quote

I Am My Body: On Judy Chicago's Birth Project¹ | | Flash Art (flash---art.com)

Louise Bourgeois - Pregnant Woman, 2008 :

Louise Bourgeois. Pregnant Woman. 2008 | MoMA

Louise Bourgeois - Pregnant Women, 2008 - Galerie Xavier Hufkens

Les têtes bleues et les femmes rouges | Louise Bourgeois | Xavier Hufkens

Information Louise Bourgeois and Pregnancy:

Betterton, R., 2009. Louise Bourgeois, ageing, and maternal bodies. Feminist Review, no. 93(ProQuest), pp. 27-45.

RESEARCH (focused)

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