In September last year, we were exploring ways to make what we do more accessible to parents. Galleries across the region are having conversations about it too. So much of that conversation was about creating spaces for audiences, and very little was about artists.
At the same time, Colette Lilley, co-founder of Liverpool Artists’ Network, and now founder of Artist Parent, had begun building a collection of interviews with artist parents about their experience of developing work under the added role of parenthood.
For many artists, becoming a parent does change how you work, what you make work about, and adds new restraints on your ability to work at all. It is also, bluntly, a point for many artists that aligns with their decision to drop practice altogether.
So this resource is invaluable. It offers support and reassurance to artist parents, insight to artists without children, and advice and prompts to producers seeking to create supportive spaces for artists with children.
Colette Lilley’s work has been profoundly affected by becoming a mother, but the experience has also presented new ways of working, using the structure of parental life to inform her work.
Many readers will be familiar with the artists’ work as hyper realistic, representational portraiture, drawn with Bic biros, but since becoming a parent, those works have been split into squares. Each square created in moments around her daughters’ schedule. And while drawing has always been therapy for the artist, it feels more targeted now.
Understanding the need for a support structure, and for representation of the stories of artist parents, Colette set out to share those changes in her own practice before inviting others to share their experiences of early and ongoing parenthood.
Paul Rooney, Anna Ketskemety, Ruth Dillon, Jon Barraclough, Leo Fitzmaurice, Luke Skiffington, Lāsma Poiša, Margaret O’Brien and dozens of others have shared their storied in interviews with Colette since last September, and the project is building and building into what will be an incredibly important archive.
For some, like Margaret O’Brien and Colette, becoming a parent has changed their practice in ways that made it more possible to manage and process ideas.
“I found I had very little continuity of thought in terms of my practice. Because of this I have tried to work smarter not harder. I continue to explore more consistent ways of working in the studio on a day to day basis, rather than focusing on large project based work only. I think this is a healthier and more balanced approach for me, although this will be an ongoing exploration, one I never fully resolve perhaps! I am also much more efficient with my time!” – Maragret O’Brien
Others, like Lāsma Poiša, share practices that have actively benefitted from becoming parents, with new experiences to explore. Although, as we’ve written about in the past, her recent exhibition at Warrington Art Gallery & Museum was a presentation of trauma, fear and joy in equal parts. Her interview with Artist Parent touches on the emotion of that:
“Motherhood transformed my artistic practice. It gave me the confidence to express myself authentically without the doubts and insecurities of my childfree past. In the early days of the postpartum madness, I photographed myself with my baby daughter and had no idea how poorly I was. In that state devoid of thought, I photographed instinctively. I had no capacity to contextualise or to consider how my images would be perceived by an audience.” – Lāsma Poiša
But for others, like Alison Dollery and Luke Skiffington, the experience of becoming a parent, rather than impacting their ideas, made them more focussed.
Jon Barraclough, too, speaks of learning “to be more open to the happy accident and the unexpected result – learned that art making is a lot like playing. I’ve also seen that youthful creativity is full of essential wisdom and knowledge – free from the boundaries we might feel when we are adults.”
There is nothing uniform about the experience of becoming a parent. But the need for support, representation, and to know there are places to learn from – from people who have been through this – is important.
Artist Parent is an important part of that now. If you’re looking for support, advice, and a bit of guidance, there is a whole host of reading materials available online through their Instagram page, and on Colette’s own website (see below).
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Words, Patrick Kirk-Smith
@Artist_Parent is an Instagram account dedicated to sharing the artwork & stories of Artist Parents, Grandparents & Caregivers.
You can read beautiful, inspiring, passionate, interviews (which are also archived on www.colettelilley.com/artist-parent) and see the artwork of artist parents under the “Tagged” section on Instagram. If you are an artist parent and would like to share your artwork tag your image @artist_parent.