Interview: Mintio and Kabul


Mintio (Samantha Tio) and Kabul (Budi Agung Kuswara) are internationally exhibited artists whose work has shifted profoundly since becoming parents. As the sexism and privilege of the art world presented new barriers, the two artists merged their separate practices into multimedia collaborations, including “The Wax on Our Fingers” and “The Current/s We Call Home.” They also founded Ketemu Project, a socially-engaged arts organization in Bali that allows them to operate beyond the commercial art world. Ketemu uses art to engage marginalized groups in the community, address environmental concerns, and support the work of fellow artists through a new family-in-residence program. When we spoke, the two parents were separated by the pandemic, with borders closed: Mintio working from home in Singapore with their 8-year old daughter, Ning, and Kabul in Indonesia, where Ketemu is based.

Cultural ReProducers is pleased to share a series of conversations with artists parenting in Singapore. This interview is part of a creative exchange between Cultural ReProducers and the artist-run gallery CommaSpace. This partnership began in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, when connecting with artists meant juggling online conversations while caring for e-learning children at home. We’re so thankful for these conversations, which raise critical questions about support, culture, and creativity.
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Cultural ReProducers: Mintio, you grew up in Singapore and Kabul in Bali, and you typically travel between the two when you’re not grounded by a pandemic. How has this shaped the culture of your family and your creative community?

Kabul: I’m not a typical Balinese: my mom is Javanese and my dad is Balinese. I grew up in this mixed culture environment, so when I was younger my family from my mother’s side, when I visited Java they brought me to a mosque to pray. And when I come here to Bali I would go to the Hindu temple to pray. Traditional Balinese they are really connected with daily cultural activities. When I went to JogJakarta for 13 years - to study, and I had my studio based there – I felt comfortable because I had 24 hours my time to manage on my own. So when I met Mintio in Jogja, I don’t see it as much different in terms of cultural background. But when I visited Singapore, I had … a challenge to fit.  Everything’s really efficient in Singapore, but my work as an artist is not a “profession” there.

Mintio & Kabul, image from "The Wax On Our
Fingers" series, cyanotype and wax on cotton.

Mintio: We are facing transnational issues in terms of Visas, and I think that’s the biggest thing that we’ve been working out the entire of our parenting and family life. Reflecting on my own cultural identity, I see myself very much of an outcome of migration. I’m born to an immigrant family of Southern Chinese and, you know, this is not my land. Whereas in Bali, Kabul has his ancestral hall, and all the lineages and histories attached to the land. I’m this kind of floating entity. Kabul really has that status as a third-culture child, by having mixed parentage. So I’m wondering what’s gonna be in it for [our daughter] Ning, as a third-culture kid.

In a sense, what we want to establish for our child is that you can be at home anywhere. You can be anything you define yourself to be. But of course that also involves a lot of scaffolding – it has to be very conscious and aware. So even as a very young child I talked to her about “What’s the difference between your cultural identity, your nationality? What does it mean? Who are you?” Because these questions get thrown to her a lot in school here: in Singapore you are believed to have this very singular identity: you’re either Malay, Indian, Chinese, or “Other.”
 

What grounds us culturally is art. We see art as that binding force in our family. That allows us to exist anywhere as a family – being nomadic, you know, we build our own kind of network as a family, creative community around the world. Kabul and I have a practice that, whatever we make, it has to fit into our luggage. Or it could be rolled or folded. That constraint gives a certain kind of liberty to where we can show – it has shaped the medium of our works. Ever since that we work a lot with tapestry, textiles, anything that can be folded. It could even be something that you could wear onto the flight, you know, like a really big jacket. The installation was about 100 meters square, but we fit everything into a self-bought bag that Kabul could take onto the flight.

Mintio and Kabul, installation view of "The Current/s We Call Home," mixed media with sound

CR: This cultural complexity informs your collaborative work. I know you work both separately and also together. Could you talk about that?

Mintio: We have our joint practice and we have our individual practices, and they are quite different. When we come together, we quite naturally turn to address the issues we are facing together. I think my own work is quite acultural because it’s quite technical. But Kabul… recently it’s become more cultural, but previously it focused more on socio-political issues.

 

Kabul: Yes, because my situation here also relates to… cultural consequences. Because my mother is Javanese and my father is Balinese from a certain caste, things happened to me as a child that didn’t allow me to carry that caste. So when I am younger, this gives me a different treatment. For example, I can’t share a cup with my family. In the beginning I see this treatment as something that really makes me sad. But after studying in university I moved to Jogjakarta, and I come to see this as a kind of freedom. I was able to see Bali more clearly, looking back. I start to learn about history, how Balinese culture formed. When I’m in Jogja I’m exploring social issues. Now that I’m back, I work closely with historical material and cultural practices that I tweak with my own understanding. For traditional Balinese they can’t do this, because it’s against their beliefs.

Mintio: Together we run an art organization called Ketemu Project in Bali. Ketemu means “to meet,” so basically what we are doing is we are meeting each other. Katemu is this… other thing, so it’s everyday work that people can connect to in Indonesia.

In our residency program, we have a family-in-residence, where we create the infrastructure to support entire families. That came from our experience being in residence at Bamboo Curtain Studios in Taiwan. We were invited as a family, so that was wonderful. Other than everybody being very welcoming, there were things like high chairs, open spaces for her to run around. Being with a child wasn’t a taboo conversation. We would bring her to all our shows, all our workshops - she was always there. So it didn’t seem like our parenting lives were separate from us throughout the entire residency.

Budi Agung Kuswara (Kabul), "The
Grateful Society," cyanotype and ink
on cotton paper

We realized that ever since we became parents, we’d been cut off from many residency opportunities. Most residencies expect you to go alone for extended periods of time. You cannot bring a spouse – you definitely cannot bring a child. We find that framework really challenging for artists holding caregiving identities, and it defines artists in a really narrow way. So we were inspired and motivated to further support families through our own residency program, to support artists more holistically. 


CR: How did your practice change when you had a child?

Kabul: For me, what had to change is having to adjust to the idea of being a parent in Singapore. I never worked in an office, or worked for other people before. Luckily, my in-laws slowly accept me, but in the beginning, they asked me to find a job [there]. I tried to do that. I spent two years for experiment. I didn’t come up with artwork that was final or ready. Sometimes I can say this artwork is “done,” just to make myself happy – but I realized this is not maximal. This was a really important process as a step to develop my work now.

The biggest thing after having kids is, What art really can do, beyond the object? To achieve this we can’t work alone. Ketemu is the infrastructure to support this vision. And what art can do, especially in this pandemic situation… the challenge in Bali is that the largest industries are shut down and no tourists can come, so what can we do? When we talk about art and creativity, it’s becoming more and more relevant to social challenges. Ketemu can be a tool and it can also be a legacy. I adjust as someone who has to take care of other people outside of myself. I enjoy parenting very much. Since our daughter was born until she is 3, 4 years, I’m the one who gives her bath every day. Because that’s how, here in Bali, parents take care. It was really rare for my circle here to have helpers to take care of their kids. But I think it will be different for Mintio.

"Instead of having this tangible end product, we think about how we can actually shape society."

Mintio photographing batik artisans for "The Wax on Our Fingers"

Mintio: I think parenthood really changed a lot. Prior to having our child, I was very much a career artist – I would do shows pretty regularly, I could draw regular income from my work. But that work was also very physically strenuous. The conditions of production, even on a logistical basis, are so different. I still have not managed to resolve it.

I photograph predominantly with the large format [camera], so I had all this really huge gear and I’d walk for hours, work alone for days at a time, with very little human interaction. Through my pregnancy I sustained a bad back injury that I’m still dealing with now, and I had to hire an assistant to carry my gear for me. It became very clear that this mode of production might not be able to sustain itself. The cost of hiring an assistant long term, and of production itself, was so high that I started to have that mindset of comparing the sheets of film that I will use to diaper money or milk powder money. And that held back... I didn’t have that same degree of experimentation that I had while being single. It became a mental block.

So what was continuing to drive my work was collaborations with Kabul. There were times when we would fight, and I would wish I could just go back to my own personal practice. But there’s also many wonderful, magical things that came out of it. We were able to travel together as a family, like the Bamboo Curtain residency. That was where the art community recognized our joint practice, and were able to give us opportunities based on that.

In Singapore I face a lot of discrimination for being an artist and a mother at the same time. When I was expecting, I applied for a scholarship to pursue my Masters. Having higher education beyond a Bachelors has always been my dream. I got good responses from the University, and got scholarships on the other end, but I needed scholarship here. The final round of interviewing came one, two weeks after I gave birth to her. I remember that day. It was pouring rain, I had to leave Kabul and Ning at home and went for my interview. The interview was scheduled to be around 3pm, and it ran late… it didn’t begin until 6pm, and I didn’t pump enough milk for her. When I got home, he was carrying her around and she was just crying. I was in tears, it was raining, it was really bad.

But what added to the whole negativity of my experience was that the whole interview became about my motherhood. When I came in, everybody clapped. And I was like “Why are you clapping?” And they said “You just gave birth, didn’t you?” And I was like “Yes…but what does that have to do with this interview?” (laughter) I was pretty anxious already, having left Kabul and Ning alone for so long. Lets get right to it. This male panelist said, “You just gave birth. What makes you think you can study?” Another male panelist was just sitting across from me doing this the whole time (leans on hand with a troubled expression, shaking her head). What they just couldn’t figure out was, how could you go do your Masters when you just had a child? It wasn’t information I gave in the application. I wasn’t being evaluated for my ability as an artist - more on the disability that I would face. I couldn’t believe that half the time of the interview I had to defend that.  In the end I didn’t get the scholarship. I’ve always been quite stimulated by the academic setting – it’s a place I want to be. But I don’t even think that I could go beyond a Bachelors now, with all the challenges.

CR: It’s a little shocking how many people still assume a woman will stop her career once she becomes a mother, even if you’re actively parenting together with a partner.

Mintio: I’m very fortunate that my earlier works have still been circulating, going around to shows, globally. But I have not managed to make anything new, besides our joint works. There’s always this pressure as an artist that you need to constantly make new work to validate yourself. But only now, in the case of the pandemic, do I tell myself “It’s okay not to make work! It’s okay to take a pause. It doesn’t mean you won’t make work in the future.” There’s the anxiety of being forgotten by your collectors, that the art world will think you’re not active anymore and hence exclude you from any opportunities.

Shortly after the interview, I was at a festival opening, the Singapore International Photography Festival. There was a curator there that I really respected. He introduced me to some other guy as “This is Mintio, but she’s not very active now because she just had a child.” I didn’t know what to say. All these microagressions, they ate into my self-esteem as an artist. When I was awarded a commission, I questioned myself. All my negotiations felt asymmetrical, and it became really unhealthy. It doesn’t seem to impact male artists in this way. They wouldn’t go up to a male artist and say “oh this is so and so, but he just had a kid, so of course he hasn’t been producing work.”

Kabul and team molding banana fibers with Mintio's photographic
prints into sail forms for "The Currents We Call Home."

CR: Are there any artists you’ve been able to look to, examples of how to make it work as artists and parents?

Mintio: I did a lot of research, actually. I went to a lot of symposiums where mothers talked about what could be done. There was one artist who said “bring your child to work,” and there were all these tips being dropped. But the ability to do all of that comes with a lot of privilege. Our family is quite modest financially. We can’t afford a caregiver or a helper, which I’m actually very thankful for. All these mothers being able to incorporate their kids, to have it all, there’s all this privilege that you don’t see. Maybe they have a hedge fund, or they draw rental income (laughter). So as much as earlier on there were parenting artists I want to emulate, in the end my earlier models were like “pffft” [makes a gesture of something going up in smoke]. 


Kabul: After we had Ning, we have been doing much more community-based work. We actually take care of many, many more people. So for me, it’s been about activating my instincts of taking care. Maybe it will mean adding additional staff that I will have to deal with, but when I look at it as a life, something that I just enjoy – our lives have this perspective by seeing what I can do, and I can learn from other artists in the same way. For me this is all natural. I don’t actually compare them. I really learn a lot, taking care of more people after we have kids.



Mintio: Instead of having this tangible end product, we think about how we can actually shape society in a certain way. It’s all about changing mindsets and perspectives. Our recent project has been about disability and mental health. It was not a physical work that we could sell -- the work was about how we could impact our own communities. I don’t know if you feel this way, but being a parent makes us aware of our own mortality. Like, what’s going to happen to Ning if I die? And it also makes us think about our legacies: What do I want to leave behind? For a lot of families in Singapore it would be like, I want to leave behind excess: a house, some money for my children… but for us it is quite clear that we don’t want to leave behind all that. So very clearly our work now is that we want to be able to leave behind a society that Ning could thrive in, where she can be herself and feel accepted. 


Interview With My Mother, Younghye Han

Younghye Han received her BFA in Traditional Ink Painting from Ewha Woman’s University and ran her own painting and drawing academy for children for five years in Seoul, South Korea.  She has been working as a seamstress and running Mainz Dry Cleaners in Manteca, CA with her husband for more than 20 years. She recently had her first exhibition at the Chicago Artists Coalition in collaboration with her daughter, Aram Han Sifuentes, an artist who combines fiber art with social practice to engage labor, cultural history, and immigrant communities. Cultural ReProducers is honored to present conversations with both artists, a testament to the intergenerational creative impact of mothers, daughters, and granddaughters. 

You can find our interview with Aram Han Sifuentes here. The interview below was conducted as part of the exhibition Younghye Han: My Mother’s First Exhibition, and begins with an introduction Aram wrote for the show: 

Younghye Han, Nara on a Pillow, 2016

My family immigrated to the United States in 1992. A trained artist in Korea, Younghye Han left that behind and has spent the last 24 years, working 12 hours a day, 6 days a week, as a seamstress and running her own dry cleaning business in Manteca, California. It has been 24 years since her last painting. Inspired by the birth of her first granddaughter in 2015, she began drawing and painting again. This is my mother’s first exhibition. It features her works made in Korea, her most recent pieces, and my responses to her last unfinished drawings made in the first year we immigrated to the United States. 

These are the questions I’ve asked my mother. Some of these are questions I’ve asked again and again throughout my life and the answers have changed and evolved throughout the years, further complicating my mother’s story. Some of these are questions I’ve never had the courage to ask her before. This interview was translated from Korean.  

Aram: How did you decide to become an artist?

Younghye: When I was seven or eight years old, I found out about an art contest at my elementary school. I went home and told my sister who yelled at me and told me to get money from our parents to apply. So I was crying when I asked my parents. They gave me the money and I went to school after hours to apply. This was my first time I participated in an art contest but I won a big prize. From then on I applied every year and continued to win big prizes. Later on I asked my sister why she yelled at me to apply. She said that she would see me draw and I didn’t draw like other kids my age. They would draw stick figures but I wouldn’t. She said I drew high heels particularly well and saw that I had talent. My sister wanted to study theater and our parents were opposed to it and didn’t let her pursue it. Then in high school our family went bankrupt and I wanted to go to college. I knew that artists wouldn’t be able to make much money straight out of school. So I was deciding whether or not to go into art or to go into nursing. Even though it would be hard, I decided to go into art. So I took the tests and got into art schools. My mother wished I wouldn’t pass. She didn’t even believe it when I passed the tests.

Aram: Why did you decide to move our family to the United States?
 
Younghye: Even though your father and I received our education from very good universities, our English wasn’t very good. So we thought that you and your sister could do anything if you knew English well. This is why we decided to move to the U.S.

Aram: What type of job did you think you would work in the U.S?
 
Younghye: I knew it would be difficult. But I just wanted you and your sister to learn English. Then you both would be able to do anything and get any type of good paying job. I didn’t think about myself so I didn’t know what type of work I would do. I just thought about your future. My parents weren’t able to help me so I wanted to make sure that I could help you both in any way.

Aram: You didn’t think about it?
 
Younghye: I thought that if other people could do find work and make it in the U.S., then I could do it too.

Younghye Han, Nara Sitting, 2016

Aram: Why a dry cleaners?
 
Younghye: When we came here, it seemed that the only jobs available to us were to run a liquor
store, ice cream shop, or dry cleaners. We didn’t want to work at a liquor store because during this time the LA riots were happening and they were targeted so we decided not to go that route. And I can do anything with my hands. I knew how to sew already and thought that working at a dry cleaners would be easier.

Aram: Did you think you would be able to practice art here?
 
Younghye: I knew that I would make art again at some point in my life before I die. It was too hard working at the cleaners. I gave up even though my mind was there and I thought about it often. But when I saw Nara, I started to make art again because I felt so inspired.

Aram: How did you feel about me becoming an artist?
 
Younghye: Now I feel happy about it. At first I was so worried. It is not an easy job and there is no stability. I know since I was an artist. It was so hard for me so I didn’t want that for you. It is too hard. Now that I have worked too hard for many years, I’ve lost my happiness. While raising you two and working so hard, my life and happiness has become lost. Now I am thankful toward you. Through you I was able to find my art again. You Facetime me every day so I can see Nara and you talk to me in Korean. I always thought that if you are kind, then life will be good to you. I gave up on this but this has come to me suddenly.

Aram Han Sifuentes, Mom’s Drawings of Roses (1992) Encased, 2016, Mulberry paper and wax

Who Cares for Whom? Parenthood in the Creative Community

Alberto Aguilar, Rest Area (Museo Picasso Barcelona), 2011

by Christa Donner

The Atlantic magazine has just bafflingly proclaimed the arts “A Field Where Working Moms Aren’t Punished” just a few months after New York Magazine published Kim Brooks’ essay with the provocative tagline “Is Parenthood the Enemy of Creative Work?” (a subtitle that was recently amended.) While many of us would be hard pressed to describe the arts as a supportive field from which to combine family and career, we also resist the long-held belief that the two are incompatible. Parenthood can be profound and generative. It can also, let’s be honest, be incredibly complicated to pursue a creative career while raising a family. It is also difficult to maintain an artistic practice while coping with a serious health concern, caring for an aging parent, dealing with political oppression, or any of the other situations that intersect our lives as human beings who make art.  Yet some of the most powerful art ever made has come from those living in the thick of challenging experiences.

Courtney Kessel, In Balance With, 2010

Unlike other professions, artmaking often happens in the (unpaid) time between other responsibilities, which means it’s the first thing to be pushed aside when any semblance of free time disappears. But here’s where being creative comes in. Eventually, when we’re ready, we invent new systems of production, we adapt creative practices to work in short bursts instead of long hours, we call on friends and family for help. We think and read and plan for a time when we’ll have more time.

So the making, it will happen. But what to do when we find ourselves excluded from artist residencies or dropped by galleries at the mention of small children? Or more subtly, when we find vast numbers of cultural events inaccessible once we’ve created another person, or come to take care of one? Why should this isolate us so profoundly from our artistic communities?

One response to structural and social problems is to work collectively. This has led to a growing number of projects including Enemies of Good Art (UK), the Mothership Project (IR), Broodwork (USA), (m)other voices (NL), Invisible Spaces of Parenthood (UK), and Cultural ReProducers (USA), a creative platform I have run since 2012. These groups create an important solidarity and a critical mass.  But reaching out can be daunting when you’re juggling personal and professional responsibilities on a whole new level.

GOING PUBLIC AS A PARENT

Creating systems of support can also happen one artist at a time. There’s plenty we can do as individuals that adds up to better conditions for all artists. On the surface there might seem to be few models for art world success for anyone raising a child. The autonomous (male) genius working late into the night is a pervasive ideal, even as diverse collaborative and social practices flourish.  Women have often kept their personal lives undercover to be taken seriously as artists, so while many have also been mothers, you’d never know without some digging. In an increasingly professionalized art scene it might still seem inappropriate to bring up family if it’s not the focus of your work. But owning our roles as artists raising children can shift assumptions and create space for parenthood as one of many possible options. Many of these ideas focus specifically on mothers or parents in general, but it should go without saying here that similar tactics can be applied to include the voices of other groups as well.

Sonja Thomsen, Trace of Possibility (installation view with crawling participant), 2013

* Mention parenthood during an artist talk. A few brief words on the challenges of reconfiguring studio time or seeing things from a new perspective can have a profound impact, making parenthood seem possible, realistic, and visible. While it is typically less damaging to the reputations of male-identified artists, it’s still rare to hear a father discuss his role as caregiver. Parental roles are changing, and these conversations matter.

* Acknowledge the impact of raising a child when applying for residencies and funding where it’s relevant. When they’re writing proposals, the performative duo Spectralina (Selina Trepp & Dan Bitney) put it this way:

We are committed to being creative and engaged with the world while making sure that this includes our daughter. Having her in our life influences our outlook and thus also our creative output. Our art is inspired by our reality, as most art is. We see her inclusion in our creative life as a cultural and political position. It is important that what is represented in the culture industry isn’t limited to the experience of single people; or to people who can afford and want a nanny; or to men who have wives who take care of their kids in the background. Art should be at the forefront of social change, and in that capacity it should offer models which allow for artist families to be visible and supported.

* Depending on timing and temperament, bring the kids to art events usually populated exclusively by adults. This can be far more stressful than staying home or digging into the budget for a sitter, but under the right circumstances it can benefit everyone involved. If you have a friend with kids (or a friend who likes kids), see if you can take turns to share the experience with family but still connect with other adults.

Sonia Delaunay, Couverture de Berceau, 1911
courtesy of the artist and Musée d'Art Moderne

* Know your foremothers, and reference them. Sonia Delaunay’s formative work of pure abstraction was a baby quilt made for her newborn son in 1911. Lea Lublin moved a crib into the Musée d’Art Moderne de la ville de Paris to perform ‘mon Fils’ in 1968, caring for her seven-month-old son in public for the run of the exhibition. Housebound with a newborn, Candida Alvarez painted on linen napkins, a practice that still informs her vibrant work. Stories like these have been buried by years of taboo and gendered hierarchy. In her recent book Mothernism, Lise Haller Baggesen calls for a repositioning of motherhood as a place of experience and indeed expertise, a valid point from which to speak:

What I am asking for here, I guess, is for mothers to occupy spaces and conversations within art and academia, to claim a voice, many voices, to speak within and against the canon, to reflect on the complexities of mothering and motherhood within that context.

* Reschedule. Timing is a practical barrier that can be hard to understand without the experience of early parenthood. The events through which an artist builds connections to their creative community – opening receptions, lectures, performances – almost always take place in the evening, in the midst of some precarious dinner-bedtime ritual. Last year I noticed several shows at prominent galleries in my city had openings scheduled for 2pm on a Saturday instead of the usual Friday night thing. Had the stars aligned? If so it was just because the exhibiting artists asked for a time that worked better for them. For at least one, it was so that his partner and two young children could join him for the event.

* Reconfigure. Beyond scheduling, there are other ways to make art spaces accessible to participants of all ages. The Ottawa Art Gallery recently announced it will pilot free childcare at art openings this year. Plug Projects in Kansas City, MO, sets aside a quiet, informal space in back with markers and coloring books so that parents can nurse or chat while their overstimulated kids take a break from the crowded intensity of the opening. This is also the room where the cold drinks are kept, so everyone passes through at least once. It’s a simple fix that can lower everyone’s blood pressure and allow people with different needs to participate.

* Ask what you’ll be paid. The question of how to financially sustain our creative lives is an issue

that affects all artists. When an artist is invited to do a visiting artist lecture or develop a new project, they're not doing it for ‘free’ if they have to pay a childcare provider or negotiate with a family member. Setting guidelines for compensation not only helps to support one's own work, it helps set a precedent for treating other artists fairly. Be specific and ask if there’s money to help cover childcare or production costs. By asking, you’ve made that part of the equation visible. 

Many of us also work with artist-run spaces that have no budget to speak of, run by creative people who are happy to support artists in other ways. While artist fees are sometimes just not possible, some spaces can offer professional photo or video documentation, while others might have part of an apartment to house your family out of town, or give access to specialized equipment.  Being clear about what we need and how we can support each other allows us to build stronger creative community.

For sliding scale fee calculators and other great resources for artists and art spaces visit CARFAC (Canada), W.A.G.E. (USA) , and Paying Artists (UK).  

 Christa Donner, grant proposal sketch for the Cultural ReProducers Event Series, 2013

 
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Christa Donner is a multimedia artist who investigates the human/animal body and its metaphors. She is the founder of Cultural ReProducers. This essay is published in partnership with Temporary Art Review, an international platform for contemporary art criticism that focuses on alternative spaces and critical exchange among disparate art communities.

Interview: Selina Trepp

still from Thinking About Inheritance, November 11, 2011

Selina Trepp  is a Swiss-American artist whose work explores economy and improvisation. Finding a balance between the intuitive and conceptual is a goal, living a life of adventure is a way, embarrassment is often the result. Growing up in a commune in a conservative small town in Switzerland taught her that there is strength in the position of the outsider. “If in doubt, be radical” is the best advice she ever got.

Selina's artistic output comes in a multitude of media: installation, video, drawing, painting, photography and sculpture. She has also developed a practice combining singing with real-time improvised video projections and performs as half of the duo Spectralina, an audiovisual collaboration with her husband Dan Bitney. Her work is widely exhibited internationally and has received numerous awards and honors including the Swiss Art Award and the Illinois Arts council Fellowship. As the mother of a toddler, Selina also manages to tackle both artmaking and parenting with a creative drive that's nothing short of incredible. We're honored to share her take on both here:

CR:  Tell us a little bit about your child in your own words.

Selina: Maxine is 2.5 years old. She is an intense but sweet spirit who likes to look and to take things in in depth. She is very focused and determined. She has the sweetest smile.

Nap Animation, from a series created
only during the unpredictable spaces 
of naptime, using Maxine's markers.

CR: Your studio practice has undergone some major changes in the past few years. How would you say parenthood has affected your work?

Selina: The other day I realized that I went from having a social practice to having an antisocial practice.

What I need my work to do for me has shifted greatly since becoming a mother. Pre-Maxine I mostly made video installations, for which I collaborated closely with other artists and which needed to be installed site specifically. My art mostly took place outside the studio and had a strong relational component. Now that I am constantly social in my home life, I want to go to the studio to be alone; I have no desire to collaborate. The studio is my place to play with materials and ideas, to tell stories and to experiment. It is also the place in which I get complete respite from being a mother. When I am there I focus on practice, on being fluid. Making images for me has become a performance, an improvisation.

My method of dealing with the obvious drawbacks of parenthood -- less time and less money -- have been to turn them into assets. Less time has resulted in more focus, thus more productivity. The effect of less money has brought me to the main conceptual restraint that I am currently working with: I work with what I have. I do not bring anything into my studio, instead I use and reuse all that has accumulated in there over the years. It is a slowly depleting system. I began this experiment in October 2012.

Sinks, archival inkjet print of studio photograph

 

 

I am now at an interesting point with this project: base materials are becoming sparse, things have run out. This constraint necessarily begins to affect the form of the work. Now when I make, the challenge is to see the potential of things. My work is changing with the circumstances. What remains is that the camera brings all parts together, flattened into a single reality.

I also see this mode of production in itself as a political position. While I do not care about making the message of my work an overtly political one, I use my actions, my production choices of non-consumption and recycling, to express my stance.

CR: How has having a child affected your relationship with the art world? What alternative structures might make that world more inclusive for artists with families?

Selina: I don’t go out as often and feel a bit disconnected to the scene. On the other hand, not going out has made me better about asking people to come to me, either in the studio or for conversation at my house. For the most part people are respectful and supportive of the fact that Dan and I are trying to raise a child while still having a full creative life. We have had amazing experiences with people who put on shows and hosted us with Maxine, who helped make things possible. I am more productive than ever, more motivated and more focused.

Rainbow, archival inkjet print, 2011

That being said, I have had my share of bad “art experiences” directly related to my status as mother. The most jarring happened right before I had Maxine. The gallery I worked with in Switzerland dumped me on some vague pretenses via email when I was 8 months pregnant. Later I learned that one of the two owners has a stated policy of not working with women who have small children. He talks about this policy in seminars for professional practices for artists. His argument for this is “that he cannot work with artists who take a break, who are not 100% dedicated to their art.” Yikes. 

Within the art community in general I would like for there to be more structural support for families to participate. Free childcare during lectures so parents can attend without needing to spend a lot of money, tours for people with kids, gallery openings beginning at 5pm, free entry to cultural and educational institutions for parents with kids would all be great. Artist residencies that provide childcare, artist residencies that allow the residents to bring their families, artist grants that fund childcare, travel grants for entire families. All these are much-needed, not just for the families, but because the contact with children enriches the entire arts community.

My method of dealing with the obvious drawbacks of parenthood -- less time and less money -- have been to turn them into assets.

Outside the specific needs parent-artists have, I see many ways that current structures are in opposition to balanced family lives. Most of the people I know fall into a pattern in which at least one of the partners works full time, while the other is a full time parent/caretaker. This is necessary to keep benefits and to maximize the families earning power. The most profound change that is needed, in my eyes, is to create a structure that enables both parents to equally participate in the rearing of their children. This would require more quality part-time work or job-sharing options, the ability to purchase affordable healthcare, and free quality education for everyone.



CR: How did you get back into a studio practice after having a newborn? Any advice to other artist-parents for getting through that phase?

Selina: I worked harder than I had ever worked while I was pregnant and had a solid body of work done by the time Maxine was born. I am very glad things worked out this way, as it allowed me to be relaxed while spending quality time with Maxine in those first months, but also ensured that I had shows lined up for the first year of her life without needing to produce new work for them. I would have been nervous not showing at all during that first year especially, and it was good for my mental state to escape the bubble here and there.

Nursing made it hard to be away from Maxine for more than a few hours at a time, and not sleeping made it hard to focus. Taking long daily walks with the baby was great in the sense that I did think a lot, and all those thoughts eventually found their way into work and made it stronger. I returned to a solid studio practice once Maxine was a bit over a year old.

In the first year of Maxine’s life my active studio practice was mostly focused on Spectralina, partially because working on Spectralina happens more in our home as opposed to the studio, and partially because we were so tight as a family unit that we wanted to do everything together.

Selina Trepp, Motherhood Flowchart After One Year of Motherhood, pencil on paper, 2012

CR:  What's the balance now between parenthood, art making, and teaching? What strategies might you recommend to other artist-parents?

Selina: I am very lucky to be in a situation in which my husband Dan and I are able and committed to sharing the work and pleasure of raising Maxine as equally as possible. Keeping things equal isn’t always easy. It requires constant renegotiation and adjustment, as we fluctuate between intensely working on projects, performing, exhibiting, teaching and having down time.

Spectralina, promotional photo with nursing Maxine

In general we split up the days into two shifts, giving each of us half a day to be with Maxine and half a day to use as needed. Up until a few months ago we had a babysitter one afternoon per week. Now Maxine attends a co-op daycare two days per week. When I am teaching, Dan is with Maxine one of the days, and the other she is in playgroup. This way when Dan is away on tour I only have half the headache of figuring out what to do with Maxine, while still being guaranteed a full day in the studio the day she’s in playgroup.

A difficulty we didn’t consider before having Maxine was that collaborating and performing together means that we need somebody to watch her while we are working, and that costs money. When we perform we need to make this work as a family: it is a priority that Maxine is happy. The last two years have been a lesson in finding playgrounds everywhere we go. We learned that a six-month-old baby is much easier to travel with than a 2-year-old toddler and that the first night in a new place is never easy.

The truth is, if it’s hard for Maxine, it is hard for all of us. We get most work done at home. We still love to travel, but it can be disruptive. If we do it, we try to do it in a way that works for all of us. Keeping that in mind we’ve learned to focus our energy [only] on projects that are financially or creatively rewarding, or, ideally, both.