Holly Stevenson
What does it mean to ‘Mother’?
Through the process of art making, and informed by the collective responses gathered from a group of mothers and artists with materially driven practices, Holly investigates ‘what does it mean to mother?’
A
ABSORBED
ACCEPTING
ADAPTATION
ALLOWING
ANGER
AMBIVALENCE
ANXIETY
B
BEGINNING
BEING
BINARY
BOREDOM
BORROW
C
CARE
CARING
CARESSING
CHALLENGE
CRYING
CLOSENESS
COACHING
COLD
COLLAPSE
COMPLICATED
COMPROMISE
CONTAINING
CURLY
CYCLICAL
D
DISTANCE
E
ENDING
EFFERVESCENCE
EXHAUSTION
EMPATHY
EMPATHISING
ENJOYING
F
FASCINATION
FEAR
FEAR
FEEDING
FLOWERS
FREEING
FRETTING
FROM BONE
G
GAINING
GOOD ENOUGH
GROWTH
GUIDE
MOTHERING/ARTWORKING WORDS
H
HANDS
HOLDING
PHYSICAL HOLDING AND HOLDING IN MIND
HATE
I
IGNORE
INFURIATE
J
K
KEEPING
KEEPING SAFE
L
LAUGHING
LETTING GO
LIFE- LONG ROLE
LIMITS
LONELINESS
LOOKING
LOSING
UNCONDITIONAL LOVE
LOVE
LOVING, LOVING
M
MERGING
MISSING
MOULD
N
NEEDING
NURTURE
NURTURING
O
OBSERVATION
OBSERVING
OBSESSING
OBSESSION
OPEN
OWNERSHIP
P
PATIENT
PITY
PLAYING
PRIDE
PRIORITY
PROTECTING
PULLING
PUSHING
Q
R
REFLECTION
REPLAY
RESPECTING
RELEASE
ROLE MODEL
ROSE
S
SEISMIC
SEPARATENESS AND SYMBIOSIS
SCULPTURE
SELF-SACRIFICE
SIGHING
SITTING (ON HANDS)
SHAME
SHAPE
SHARP
SHARING
SHARING
SHOEING
SIMPLE
SKIN TO SKIN
SMILING
SMOOTH
SMOTHERING
SMOTHER
SOOTHING
SORROW
SPLITTING
SPENDING TIME WITH
SOCIALIZATION
SQUEEZE
STRUGGLE
STUDYING
SUBMERGED
SUBMISSION
SURPRISED BY
SUPPRESSION
SUPPORTING
T
TRUSTING
U
UNCONDITIONAL LOVE
UNDERSTANDING
UNKNOWN
V
W
WAKEFUL
WANTING
WARM
WATCHFUL
WATCHING
WEIGHT
WHATTHEFUKKERY
WONDER FOODS
WORRYING
X Y Z
With a profound interest in psychoanalysis, the artist aims to offer interpretations and a view on the different experiences of mothering considering and questioning the idea of the ‘good enough mother’, first coined in 1953 by paediatrician and psychoanalyst D.W. Winnicott.
Resulting in a series of ceramic sculptures, Holly gleans language and forms that relate art making to mothering and mothering to art making, choosing the material of ‘clay’ as meaning for nurturing, labour intensive and unpredictable practices.
‘The Nocturnals’ are a series in which I thought directly about the feedback I was given in the task ‘What Does it Mean to Mother’? I thought about splitting, watching, gazing, superfoods, care and so on. I’ve used a mirror glaze and considered interrelationship between forms as the sort of maneuver around a yellow circle of glaze that loosely represents the moon.
The work is part of the Procreate Project commission 2020 round supported by Arts Council Emergency Response funds.
