Visit MOM’s New Storefront With Guest Artist Feature: Luci Westphal

Visit our new MOM Storefront

MOM is thrilled to announce the opening of our new online store! In addition to our awesome new branded product line we will be featuring a new guest artist quarterly throughout the year. In every case, the artist feature will be something that is in-line with MOM’s values of multicultural inclusivity and will pull from multiple mediums. To that end, we are pleased to include Luci Westphal (2/22-5/2022) along with a few special items from her diverse portfolio. The link to the store is here and please read on to learn more about Luci and her creations.

Luci is a documentary filmmaker, artist, and photographer originally from Hamburg, Germany, who came to Florida to study film. After 20 years of traveling, working, and making art in Brooklyn, Berlin, and Colorado, she has returned to the south to join the Artist Enclave of Historic Kenwood (AEHK) in St. Petersburg, Florida. Now, with wonder and delight, she is able to explore and capture the lovely Florida landscapes, fauna, and flora with fresh eyes while continuing work on the third post-production edit of her film t All’s Well and Fair. 

Documentary Filmmaker and Photographer Luci Westphal

Luci is devoted to making the world a happier place. To that end, her social media and business support that missive. She has been photographing nature wherever she has lived or traveled. She is also at work on the third installment of a documentary that follows three punk moms through their trials, tribulations, and evolutions. 

Here are some more specifics about Luci and her endeavors.

LUCI WESTPHAL IN HER WORDS:

  • From 2010 until 2017, I published the weekly video series Moving Postcard, which gives you a glimpse every week of a special location, event or person. Always free to watch and share. 
  • In 1996, I began filming the on-going documentary project All’s Well and Fair. Every ten years (1996, 2006, 2016) I interview Florida punk rock moms Tina, Margaret, and Rachel, plus their children (!) and then release a new version of the film. The third version is currently in post-production. See Luci’s Patreon page here to view a trailer of the film and support her work.
  • In 2017, I launched Happier Place where I publish most of my photo essays and writing and sometimes videos that are a continuation of the Moving Postcard web series.
  • And all along the way, I photograph anything I find appealing: nature, animals, street art, cityscapes…
  • Please follow me: Twitter: https://twitter.com/luciwest Insta: https://www.instagram.com/luciwest/

Instagram: @luciwest

Twitter: @luciwest

We have asked Luci to join us as a featured artist in our online storefront because she represents the best in all of us: a willingness to work hard and play nicely with others, she is a woman who has demonstrated awesome filmmaking, art, and business skills, and she is a key member of the MOM community in St. Pete.

It has been our distinct pleasure to welcome Luci to MOM as our first featured artist at the MOM Storefront online. and also a person of fortitude and resilience, who happens to be as devoted to trees as we are.

About Our New Featured Artist Platform:

Our Invitation: You are invited to participate in our ‘Featured Artist’ segment at the Museum of Motherhood online. Our intention is to highlight the work of a broad community of individuals as we collect, preserve, and disseminate articles, books, artifacts, ephemera, images, and research on all aspects of the art, science, and history of women, m/others and families, including reproductive identities, Mother Earth, and spirituality. 

Our storefront actively promotes members within our community for the purposes of starting great conversations, creating thought-provoking exhibits, and sharing information, education, and works from a diverse, inclusive, and multicultural perspective. 


It is our desire that these works, for sale, need not be exclusive to our site, but rather support the creator of the works as well as MOM through their sales through our storefront. Artist is responsible for shipping and shipping cost as well as returns. All processing happens through MOM with the bulk of all monies going back to the artist.

Write us if you are interested in participating and make sure to include a sample of your work: INFO@MOMmuseum.org

For any additional questions regarding who we are and what we do here at MOM, along with other programs we offer, be sure to browse our website or email us at Info@MOMmuseum.org. We are excited to start this new program with our community of artists at MOM to support their talents and causes for the community at large. Be sure check re to check out our storefront after browsing to support these fantastic individuals.

A Look Back

As January ramps up, Americans and indeed, people around the world, are experiencing a kind of deadening whiplash that feels deeply problematic. From pandemics to earth shattering social events, our planet seems to be pushing back in unprecedented ways. Are we going to listen?

Here at the Museum of Motherhood our aim is to inspire as well as to educate. How do we balance dire predictions, and unrelenting reality, with uplifting content? Do we pretend, making conscious decisions to ignore what is right in front of our faces, like the movie Don’t Look Up? Or, do we create small changes through everyday actions by staying vigilant, practicing tolerance, and also heeding the call to make amends, offer support, or reach out to someone in need?

What does change even look like anyway? How can we possibly have any affect on anything when everything feels bigger than us as individuals?

In my experience, it is the little things that count. It is the everyday actions of many people doing one brave, smart, or kind action that inspires connection, healing, and hope. I think our lives are made up of little moments. Those individual moments can be transformative: One football play can win a Super Bowl. One song can reach millions of ears with a message of encouragement (or laughter). One person, holding someone’s hand in a hospital can mean the difference between fear and comfort.

At MOM, we are comprised of the individual academics, artists, and students who gained insight during their time with us, the visitors who told us their secrets and asked for help, and the strangers who have connected through the years– who are not strangers anymore.

We are a small museum with big dreams. But, more than the big dreams, we aim to touch hearts and minds individually. We aim to offer a safe space of illumination and awe. I’m excited to introduce some new initiatives in the coming months that include an online community, our upcoming conference, and a newly launched storefront that will feature guest artists.

When a friend wrote me recently, and included a note (along with a check), that stated my/ OUR museum was wonderful – I realized a simple dream of mine – the dream that others would want to take MOM on as their own. It was never intended to be ‘my’ museum, even though I have been nursing it along all these years.

As we look back, let us also look forward. Let us rally against the darkness by joining our individual lights into a collective of lights, each bright, each different, and all connected. Let us remember the souls we have lost, while lifting our own spirits in unity and appreciation of this brief, difficult, and tenuous life we share on this planet and try to ‘do better’.

I send you peace in the New Year.

Martha Joy Rose, Founder/Director

Things In-between

By Rebecca Louise Clarke

Of course, one day there will be a museum collection about the pandemic. In fact, they’re working on it right now, collecting the pieces of a crisis as it unfolds in the hope that somehow it won’t get lost in the movement of time, that one day we will see ourselves or have ourselves be seen.

But knowing that history involves selection, that some pieces of memory will necessarily be chosen over others and therefore some of us will blow away, I want to show a vision of my life, my family’s life over the last two years. It could be two years, one or three because who knows? It has been a time, in which time has been lost. Each day seems the same and yet things move forward.

These things are my daughter’s/mine/her Dad’s. These moments are my own, enmeshed in the fabric of my family.

I don’t want our memories to be swallowed up by that terrifying giant; the pandemic; our experiences to be defined by a turbulent era of history. The little things that together make up our lives, have been injured, but still, those little things keep breathing. Most of the time they drag themselves, tired and bloody, but now and then, they unleash a triumphant boogie.

Our ginger tomcat died. The neighbour’s house was torn down.  Adult teeth erupted, school started, stopped and started again.  And the things in-between.

Here is my vision. A basket of things from me to you.

Mask
Family
Hieroglyphics


Spoonville
‘Let it go’
Feelings
Breathe
Broken house
Goodbye
Storm
Offerings
Angel

Photographs by Richard Clarke and Rebeca Louise Clarke [Original interview here].

Rebecca Louise Clark

Rebecca Louise Clarke is an author, scholar and media artist who is interested in the ways mothering and memory are depicted in museums. Her book Representations of Mothers and the Maternal in Museums, to be published in early 2023 by Routledge is currently in development and examines the ways mothering is represented in museum collections and exhibitions. During her residency with the Museum of Motherhood (M.O.M.), Rebecca is doing an in-depth case study of M.O.M. Her analysis seeks to discover ways that experiences of mothering as voiced by mothers themselves, can challenge heteronormative, stereotypical ideals about motherhood and how innovative museum practice can disrupt conventional ideals about motherhood.

If you are interested in applying for a guest residency here at MOM, please go to our website HERE: https://bit.ly/3uRgugm  to find out more. BE SURE TO HURRY! Spots have been filling FAST! We hope that future tours of the space will be available soon, but they are by appointment only in Artist Enclave Historic Kenwood: “where art lives.”

CFP Deadline Approaching – MOM Conference/JourMS 2022

Museum of Motherhood Academic & Arts Conference & Journal of Mother Studies (JourMS)

March 25-26, 2022

St. Petersburg, Florida (In-Person & Via Zoom)

Early Submissions Dec 15/ Notification January 15; Late Submissions by Jan 15/Notifications sent by Feb. 15

Creativity for a Cause in Theory & Practice

This conference focuses on creativity, advocacy, and activism through theory and practice. Connect and collaborate! Presenters and participants will share examples, experiences, and analysis of artistic expression, social justice, identity, and action. Given the current climate, relevant questions might include: How do we heal trauma? How can art be leveraged for community connection and social change? What works and what doesn’t work? Where have we been? Where are we now? Where do we hope to be? What is radical self-healing?

We welcome submissions from makers, scholars, students, activists, artists, community agencies, service providers, journalists, women, men, mothers and others who work, play, or research in this area. Cross-cultural, historical, and comparative work is encouraged. We encourage a variety of types of submissions including academic papers from all disciplines, workshops, creative submissions, performances, storytelling, visual arts, film, music, audio and other alternative formats. Topics include (but are not limited to):

Radical healing. Women’s issues. Representing Maternal creativity in Film, Video, Fine Arts, Music, and Theater; Women and Representation; Race, Representation and Families mobilizing voices through creativity; Maternal Ambivalence in visual culture; Women and Loss, Depression, and Domestic Violence; Performing Feminism in Practice and Expression; Mother Writer, Daughter Writer: Writing Motherhood; Writing Family, Facilitating the Creative Family; Imaging LGBT Mothers and Maternity; “Late Bloomer” Art: Post-Maternal Artists & Non-Procreators by Choice; Representing Motherhood on the Internet; Motherhood, Art, and Creativity; Healing and Creativity; Families and Disability: Mothers as Creative Cultural Force; Photography; Behind the Camera: Women as Filmmakers, Directors, Producers; Activist Musicians across Musical Genres: Rock, Rap, Folk, Blues, Jazz, Country; Narratives of Creative Mothers: Expressing: Imaging Breastfeeding Mothers, Mommy Bloggers: Re-Writing Motherhood, etc.; Dealing with (Post-partum) Depression by Making Creative Work; Pregnant moms; Earth Mothers and Nature Grrrls; Celebrity mothers; How images of fathers impact representation; News media coverage of foster moms; Women in politics; teen mothers in film or television; Mothers as consumers; Mothering and the representation of Class and Transformation Through Creative Empowerment, Dance, Sports, Literature, and Media; Gender-fluid expressions of creativity and parenthood; Social Change and Social Activism in History and in Contemporary America.

DOWNLOAD CFP 2022 PDF

SUBMIT TO: INFO@MOMmuseum.org

All submissions are considered for publication at the Journal of Mother Studies (JourMS).