Interview: Ana Álvarez-Errecalde

Simbiosis / Symbiosis (Serie Las Cuatro Estaciones, 2013-2014)

Ana Álvarez-Errecalde is an Argentinian artist based in Barcelona.  In her work she delves into personal experiences such as vital cycles, immigration and motherhood. She has exhibited throughout Europe and South America, including solo projects for the City of Women Festival (Liubliana, Slovenia), Centro Cultural de Espana (Buenos Aires, Argentina), and the Centro Cultural Drassanes (Barcelona, Spain). Her work is part of the 2015 exhibition Critica De la Razon Migrante, which has traveled to venues in Paraguay, Honduras, and Guatemala. Ana is passionate about issues of childbirth, which she has addressed in the projects The Birth of My Daughter (2005) and Cesarean: Beyond the Wound (2009). Cultural ReProducers is honored to share this conversation with Ana Álvarez-Errecalde brought to us by artist and mother Irene Pérez.


Cultural ReProducers: Briefly describe your children in your own words.

Ana: My eldest son is pure contemplation, beauty, and a mixture of fragility and strength. He inspires us by pushing our limits, making us face humility and embrace the lack of control, while letting us appreciate sublime mysteries. My daughter and my younger son are joy, curiosity, creativity, wit, endless possibilities, strength, assertiveness, freedom, collaboration, beauty and genuine empathy.

Anunciación / Anunciation (Serie Las Cuatro Estaciones, 2013-2014)

CR:  What was it like for you to become an artist-mother? What kinds of support or lack of support did you encounter?

Ana: I became an artist when I became a mother. My first son was born with a severe neurological condition, and with that experience I saw all of my certainties crash around me. We were in New York City and I was spending a lot of time caring for him and trying to do a very exhausting early intervention program while living far away from friends and family. Everything was so overwhelming and I was feeling so lonely that I started taking photographs as a way to cope. I needed to focus on the beauty of my son regardless of his challenges.

Combining my family life with my art has become something organic. My children are around during most of my photo shoots, and they also take part in my husband's projects (he is also an artist). We have decided to create a life together where there is no delineation between the art creation and family life. We travel together, mount exhibitions with the children around, and discuss new ideas at the dinner table.

The arts community and market has offered very little support. I have submitted a few of my projects to open calls which offer funding but curiously enough all the money had to be spent on the art production, so there is never money left for personal and family needs.  My immediate community (which lately is mostly online) supports my art by giving visibility to what I do and by taking part in my projects. Over the years, with a broader recognition of my artwork, I am starting to participate in art festivals and exhibitions that have given their support not only economically but also logistically.


CR: At what point did you begin incorporating your children and other family members directly into your work?


Ana: Before focusing on photography and installation, I was working as a producer for Buenos Aires Television and also at PBS in New York City. I was mainly involved in the production of documentaries, so I was always intrigued by the recording of personal stories. 
From the moment I became pregnant for the first time I started documenting this transformative process. I was not pursuing any specific artistic or aesthetic goal, but the shift in priorities, learning about myself under a completely different perspective, was intriguing. Documenting that change was a tool to understand what I was going through and who I was becoming.

Sombra / Shadow (Serie Las Cuatro Estaciones, 2013-2014)

CR: Do you consider parenting as part of your artistic practice and vice versa? Would you say including your children in your work plays a role in their upbringing?

Ana: My mothering is not a performance. The relationship I have with my children exists even if no one is looking. The reason I expose certain aspects of my mothering to the public is because I think that motherhood has been idealized, and only a very constricted version of birth and parenting has been exposed. I feel that it is important to contribute these experiences that have been banned or silenced, and that can expand the references that as a society we have about mothering. In my artwork I not only portray myself as a mother but as a daughter as well.

I have learnt a lot through each one of my empowering respected births, mothering a child with special needs and total dependency, having a late gestational loss (at home), raising a pre-teen girl,
and committing to freedom not through a selfish pursuit of independence but through the exercise of
chosen responsibility and generous love. I have met wonderful people who have told me they had abortions because they knew that their babies had certain anomalies and they could not imagine themselves coping with these difficulties. Although I am pro-choice, I also feel that in order to choose you need to have as much information as possible. You need to know that life can be wonderful and meaningful even when you are facing difficult challenges, and this is something that is not usually
told. The lack of horizontal and empathetic information makes for an easily manipulated society.


Including my children in my work and my husband's work plays a role in their upbringing in the same way that it did for us to go to work with our own parents when we were young to help them in their non-artistic jobs. The importance is not in the kind of job that they are participating in, but in the quality time we share. The importance for any child is in realizing that their contribution is useful and appreciated. That they are part of something bigger. That they are important.


CR: The body, mostly but not exclusively female, has a central role in your discourse. Where does your interest in the body as a vessel and communicator of ideas come from? Do you think this interest has a direct connection with your motherhood?

Ana: I photograph the body, mainly female, to re-appropriate something that is ours and which has been used, ridiculed, violated, admired, judged, exploited, and objectified throughout history. How I relate to the  body is a mirror of my fascination with life. I am accepting of my changing body, amazed by how my children grow, and intrigued by the aging process. I have enjoyed my pregnancies and have had joyful, intense home births. The blood and nudity seen within the context of my artwork is linked to this authenticity and undiluted sensuality.

I am interested in the body as territory: a place in which each life leaves its trace, not for its aesthetic value. Culturally, female bodily functions have been concealed and treated as something shameful. I expose blood in order to show that we are not objects, and to denounce the debilitation, domestication, and exploitation that women are often subjected to.

Ana Álvarez-Errecalde, My Parents, 2003

 CR: Some of your work documents events that are private and intimate - for example the birth of your daughter or the caring labor for your eldest son. What has it been like to bring these to the context of the exhibition space?

Ana: I took the photographs for El Nacimiento de mi Hija (The Birth of my Daughter, 2005) because I had a profound need to see this sort of maternity represented. While I was pregnant with my daughter, every time I would close my eyes to go to sleep, I had this recurring image of being connected to my baby by my umbilical cord. When I took these photographs it wasn't my intention to include them as part of my artistic work. I didn’t know if the home birth would allow me to capture these moments, I just wanted to do my best to create an image like the one that had enchanted me in my mind. When I saw the contact sheet (at that time I was still shooting film) I soon understood that these photographs had a universal importance that transcended the personal documentation of my experience. I was healthy, happy and lucid to the extent of being able to do a self portrait! I felt that these photographs could help others rethink the idea of the fragile, painful, out of control and overly medicated birth that is considered the norm, but it also goes beyond the occurrence to delve into deeper issues of our understanding of society, fear, and life. This is why it was important to share this and other projects in the context of the exhibition space.

El Nacimiento de mi Hija / Birth of my Daughter, 2005

CR: The photograph of your daughter’s birth has provoked strong reactions, for and against. What did you want to convey or express? Do you think people have understood?

Ana: With this diptych I wanted to contribute my experience to expand on the constrained social imagery of motherhood. My experience of childbirth is not unique: throughout history many women have had enjoyable, unmedicated, independent, and free births. However these stories have rarely been told. Circulating these self-portraits through arts and media contexts is my way of refuting the idea that childbirth is a divine punishment, an imminent danger, and a painful burden, which we need to free ourselves from. The intensity of labour has a purpose. The pain is proportional to the fear. Childbirth can be a rite of passage. Often I get messages from people from different parts of the world who thank me for sharing this intimate experience. There are also those who feel distaste and compare giving birth to other physiological processes, like defecating. For me this is indicative of the value we give to childhood and maternity. There are people who have had horrifying, abusive, or simply misinformed experiences of labour, and seeing these photographs can confront them with what their experience could have been but wasn't. Sometimes we hide away our sorrows and these images can act as a trigger to something we wish we could forget.

Though I am proud and thankful for many of the positive changes gained by the activism of the Feminist movement, much of this feminism from the last decades was responsible for putting motherhood in the closet. Maternal desire became seen as a failure and a weakness that hindered our creativity, intelligence and development. The natural expectations of babies, as mammals, were not taken into account. Medicine and the pharmaceutical industry rushed forward to offer anesthetized births and milk in bottles that freed the mother from the intrinsic dependence of her young.  For me, violence towards women begins with the repression of sexuality, the appropriation of childbirth, the interference with all vital cycles and the creation of manipulative roles. A negated mother will also negate her body and her presence to her children, so they will all ultimately conform to our unattended, unloved, and unnourished society. This violence consists in promoting shortcomings that trigger a disproportionate consumerism that is perverse and unsustainable. A fulfilled woman who accepts her body and finds pleasure in sharing it with her offspring is a revolution in her own right, because she stops being part of a establishment that feeds the enormous unsatisfied needs of future men and women.

from the series, CESAREAN, beyond the Wound, 2009

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Irene Pérez is a visual artist now living and working near Barcelona, Spain. She shares her life with a passionate physicist, their vibrant five-year-old daughter, and a black cat named Nit. Irene is currently working on the project New Universe; a series of works that explore the learning processes occurring within a family. New Universe will open in fall 2016 as an exhibition, lecture series and workshops at the Documentation Center and Textile Museum of Terrassa, Spain.

Interview: Irene Pérez

Irene Pérez is an artist and curator investigating memory, identity, home and housing. Born and raised in Spain, she studied Art History before relocating to the US, where she pursued two art degrees in photography and studio art. While she was still a student she began organizing ambitious exhibitions and projects, serving on the curatorial team for artXposium and co-founding the Second Bedroom Project Space with fellow artist Christopher John Smith in addition to making and exhibiting her own work. Upon returning to Spain, however, Irene struggled to reconnect to the art community there, especially once her daughter was born. After a lot of hard work, this year has been a good one: she has already had two solo exhibitions in 2013 and is looking forward to several upcoming group shows and artist residencies. Her interview is a candid reflection on the challenges of balancing motherhood, art, and identity.  

CR: Tell us a little bit about your daughter: age, name, general temperament?
Irene: Maia is a strong, chatty, stubborn, creative, moody, loving and intelligent person whom I’ve been falling in love with for the last three years. She just turned three, so for the last year she has been going through her “twos” phase (let me tell you they don’t call them terrible for nothing) which turned her into a very temperamental little girl. But just three weeks into her “threes” I can see some changes happening and she is becoming more communicative and less irritable.

CR: How do you find a balance between parenthood, artmaking, and a day job? What strategies might you recommend to other artist-parents?

Irene: In my experience finding balance is a day-to-day endeavor. Being a mother is a new experience for me, and life with a child changes constantly as they grow up. So, there are both a learning curve and a high degree of instability that become part of your daily life.

Since Maia was born, my professional status has changed twice. I was unemployed during my pregnancy and until Maia was 10 months old. I had just returned to Spain and was still trying to get reacquainted with my home country and the art world here. After Maia was born, I was just trying to keep myself together and not collapse from exhaustion. Still, with no studio and a small baby, I kept producing some work and participated in a couple of group shows. The way it worked out was to work during Maia’s naps, sometimes even with Maia in my lap, and then during the few hours Maia’s dad could look after her.

When Maia was 10 months old I got a full-time job. I worked at this company for a year and a half, Monday through Friday. Between the commute and my working schedule, I ended up only being able to see Maia for about 1 hour each day. I used Sundays to work in my studio for 5-6 hours every week. That was a nightmare -- both because I couldn’t spend time with my daughter and because I didn’t have worthy time making art (I am a slow producer). Fortunately, I had the option to quit, and I am now an (almost) full time mom/artist, doing work a few times a month as an exhibition guide and doing art workshops. Maia now goes to preschool, so I drop her off in the morning and most weekdays I go to my studio during the hours she is there.


I do have to say that I have family, my parents-in-law especially, who help us out. Sometimes when I am preparing for a show, they take care of Maia after school. My husband and I have also, little by little, been working out a system. He is a research scientist and his job is very demanding, time consuming and he travels often. We take turns picking up Maia after school and taking her to the playground or the library. It does take a village, not only to raise a child, but so that her parents can have productive lives as well.

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?

Irene: It took me a while to have a full studio practice again. During the first few months I didn’t have a studio and worked at home, which allowed me to have Maia by my side. But it wasn’t until Maia started going to preschool that I got a studio space and went back to making art regularly. Up to that moment I mainly kept notes and sketches for works, so when I finally had my studio I had lots of ideas and was very excited to realize them.

For the first few months of your child’s life you think and feel often that you will never be able to make art again. I couldn’t see how I would manage two such demanding things together, both of which I wanted to give 100%.  All the advice I can give now, seeing things in perspective and only three years into motherhood, is to be patient and don’t give up. Take time to enjoy being with your child, and even take her with you into your studio if possible and safe.

CR: How has parenthood affected your creative practice and/or the work itself?

Irene: The fact that I am now not only responsible for my daughter’s education but also truly invested in her becoming a fulfilled, honest and happy person has made me realize that I can only help her achieve all that by example. I became a professional artist not that long ago when I graduated at age 33 (I am 38 now), so I had my doubts about being able to pull through since I got here a bit late. This has changed my practice in two ways: one, I do not give up when things do not work out; two, I follow my principles making artwork that I believe in and, if applicable, sharing my ideas and art experience with others. I now volunteer through the Documentation Center and Textile Museum of Terrassa teaching embroidery to psychiatric patients. Together, these patients, their therapists and myself have created the Collage of Memories project, made up of embroidered pieces that reproduce specific moments and memories from our past.

As for the work itself, I am starting to see a turn more towards social issues that worry me, both because of the alarming situation we are living in Spain (economic but most importantly in relation to the loss of our social rights) and because I fear for my daughter’s future. My recent piece sinHogar (homeLess) was made in reference to the hundreds of thousands of evictions that have taken place and are still taking place in my country, leaving hundreds of thousands of families homeless and without any chance of recovering.

In a way my work is also becoming a conversation with my daughter about the things I want to share with her. I hope that as Maia grows older she will take a more active part into my work just because it is an experience I want to share with her. So far, her voice has made it into one of my most recent video pieces.

CR:  Has having children affected your relationship with the art world? What alternative structures might make the art world more inclusive for artists with families?

Irene: Yes and no. When you have a small child, it is difficult to be able to go to openings that usually happen in the evenings, so that cuts down on opportunities to network. Still, I go to exhibitions on my own (less often than before my daughter was born) or with Maia -- something I really like to do because it has become an amazing learning experience for both of us. I network any other way I can, usually through the Internet.

It is also harder, economically, logistically and time-wise, to travel for work or go on residencies. You adapt and look for opportunities that you can make work for your situation. As I am writing this, I am at a residency at Nau Côclea, in Camallera, Girona, Spain. I’ll be spending ten days here working on a new project and since this place is only two hours away from where we live, Maia and my husband can come and spend the weekend here with me. Later on this summer, I’ll be in a residency through People Made Visible for three weeks at the West Chicago City Museum. Maia and her dad will accompany me for two weeks while I work, which will be our family vacation this year.

CR:  Is there anything else you’d like to address that hasn’t been asked?


Irene: At a personal level, my experience with motherhood as an institution hasn’t been good. For the first year and a half of Maia’s life I loved my child but was at war with motherhood, because it had taken away everything I had worked for in the previous ten years and made very real some of my insecurities and fears. I also felt motherhood, or should I say the social construct of motherhood (especially here in Spain), took my social “status” and role as a woman back 50 years.

Everybody tells you your life is going to change when you have a child, but you really have no clue what they are talking about until you are a parent. It was hard to come to terms with giving up studio time and the complete freedom to decide. It was even harder to see how becoming a mother made me feel that socially I was only valued in relation to giving birth and taking care of my child.

What I have come to realize is that, as much as artmaking is my way of making sense of the world, Maia is a crucial part of my life experience. Not being in the studio whenever I need to be is still difficult, but it is equally hard to take away time spent with my daughter for how important it is to both of us.

A friend told me jokingly: “Becoming a mom has turned you into a feminist.” But it is not a joke. I thought feminism was a thing from the past, and before having Maia I was naïve enough to think there was no need for women to fight against the social norm since I had never experienced discrimination for being a woman. Now I see I have to be part of a positive change for women. And I have to be part of change most especially for one woman-to-be: my little Maia.