MOM is pleased to welcome Mär Martinez for our September Residency at the MOM Art Annex in St. Petersburg, Florida. Mär is an interdisciplinary artist specializing in sculptural painting. Her work dissects dominance, aggression and power dynamics through the lens of a culturally-enforced binary system. She received a BFA in Painting and a BA in Art History at the University of Central Florida.
Selected Awards include: Bridge Ahead Initiative Grant, Bronfman Artist Grant Finalist, Jewish Art Salon Student Fellow, FusionFest Best in Show Award, Order of Pegasus Finalist, Katherine K. & Jacob Holzer Art Scholarship, Frank Lloyd Wright Scholar Recipient, and the Miniature Fine Arts Society Award. Select 2021 Exhibitions include: A Tiny Bit of Fire, London, GENESIS: The Beginning of Creativity, NY, Raw Fibers, FL, GALEX 55 National Juried Competition, IL, ARTFIELDS 2021, SC, Collaborative Animals, OH and Sugar, Spice, and Not Playing Nice, NY. Select 2020 Solo Exhibitions include: FRACTURE, FL, Illusions of Safety, PA, and Schism, FL. Select 2020 Exhibitions include: 2020 Florida Biennial, FL, B20: Wiregrass Biennial, AL, Feminine/ Masculine, Hungary, 2020 College Invitational, IN, and Artfields 2020, SC.
In 2020, Martinez was Artist-in-Residence at a printmaking-focused residency in Florida. She was Artist-in-Residence at The Spruce in Pennsylvania and conducted visual research through her sculptural paintings. Martinez is a member of the Dorothy M. Gillespie Foundation Advisory Board in Nyack, NY. She is Gallery Admin at Parkhaus15, a DIY artist-run exhibition space in its seminal year in Orlando, FL. She is Special Programs Director at SOBO Gallery in Winter Garden, and is affiliated with the collaborative printing press Flying Horse Editions in Orlando, FL.
In 2021, she was Artist-in-Residence at the Stay Home Residency in Tennessee, and served as the Curator-in-Residence at the Dorothy M. Gillespie Foundation in New York. She will be Resident at the M.O.M. Museum in Florida in the fall. Martinez has recently been accepted as Art and History Museums Maitland’s 2022 Artist-in-Action, and will begin her residency this winter. She can be reached at www.marmartinezart.com or @meatvoid on Instagram.
Introducing MOM’s most recent artist in residence, multidisciplinary artist Jillian M Rock.
In her work, Jillian M Rock utilizes print in various forms to archive narratives centered in Blackness. Through collage, risograph prints and accompanying narrative, her work is meant to amplify the everyday to dismantle stereotypes of Blackness.
As previously mentioned in our social media platforms, Rock is the owner of Rock Press, a Black woman run printing press aimed at amplifying access to the creation and dissemination of artists’ books and printed matter. Rock is also a teaching artist, an active member of the LAND Collective, on faculty at Studio Montclair and serves on the Board of Directors for the Newark Print Shop. She was in the 2020 Cohort of Feminist in Residence, at Project for Empty Space (PES). In speaking with Rock, her passion for her work in art education and her drive to enlighten her community clearly shine through all she does. Her passion for her work and unique perspective offer valuable insights each of us can learn about ourselves, and how we both live in and affect the world around us. This post-residency highlight aims to further allow us to learn more about her work during her residency, as well as her personal thoughts throughout her stay while designing her project.
When deciding to have her residency at the M.O.M. Art Annex, she wanted to work on her ongoing publication and audiovisual series “When A Rock Rest,” which highlights the significance of rest as a radical act of self-love and joy. Through photo documentation of life during the residency, as well as accompanying text, she wanted to develop a narrative art/photo book, consisting of collages aimed at dismantling stereotypes of the angry Black woman, and instead highlight how Black women, specifically Black mothers, fall further into their softness with rest, reflection, and recalibration. She signified it is a biographical journey of womanhood, motherhood and an ode to her last name, Rock. However, upon arrival at the annex, and taking in how much work the museum had on its walls, she changed her initial desires from wanting to create a larger framed collage to a piece she felt could best live in the museum. This led her to the idea of creating a booklet. Ultimately, she felt a booklet was “something small enough to be tucked in or displayed separately,” allowing her individual work to be showcased in multiple ways, while still allowing the space to serve as an environment from which future artists can both live and create without outside influence from previous works.
Finished Booklet Piece “Mama, All Roads Lead to You” an 11×17, 3 layer risograph print of a digital collage of photographs taken during Rock’s stay in the MOM Art annex for their archive collection. Printed at Print St.Pete. Piece contains the author’s poem, which can be found in full text below.
The process of designing and making her print into a booklet served as a new feat for Rock, as she had never made a former booklet of her work. To not only broaden her knowledge in risograph printing but to expand her artist community, she traveled to the St. Pete Print shop-Print St.Pete, where she immediately connected with founder and artist Kaitlin Crockett. While there, she realized that in creating a booklet, accompanying text would need to be included. As the original idea of her work became to shift and reshape in her mind’s eye, she felt it necessary to include text in order to develop her new concept. Ultimately it led to her creation of a concept she preferred over her initial plans.
Rock noted that she began the process of creating her piece slowly. Giving herself time to slow down, and ease into the work. She had time to be still, which in turn altered her perspective. That is where her peace came from. As she continued to create, she traveled to the nearby beach, and took pictures of the scenery as well as outside of the museum. While doing all of this, she continuously wanted to emphasize the importance for such rest. More specifically, the importance of rest for Black women. Rock identified that Black women are often stereotyped as “strong” and “aggressive” into a somewhat performative role in culture due to preconceived expectations. Therefore additional elements that highlight the other traits and characteristics Black women possess in society are overlooked. Thus creating an inaccurate representation. She argued that, Black women are strong and can be aggressive. However such characteristics are not the only things by which they are defined, nor are they a hallmark by which to generalize the complex nuances of Black women’s characters. They still need rest and time for themselves-with the ability to be themselves. The importance of this practice can be applied to all women, but especially mothers in particular. Which is what led to this perspective taking shape within her project and utilizing her own experiences in motherhood to create her project.
Rock’s unique story and narrative as a mother centers on wanting to be the mother she never had. Rock had her children young, in her early twenties, and loves having them around, spending time with them often and doing many things together. She believes having children young helped her form this close bond, as it allowed her to associate with her own generation while also allowing her to be present in the here and now. In this way, motherhood and children helped form her into the person she is, and have kept her consistent. Further commenting on her relationship with her children, she acknowledges that she places them on equal footing with her, leading to a relationship dynamic that has fostered strong bonds of love and support.
Artist Image in “Mama, All Roads Lead to You”
Rock wanted to highlight her confidence as a woman in her piece, regarding the combined importance of rest, self-fulfillment and sensuality. In developing her contribution to the M.O.M. archives, she had taken a picture of herself outside lounging in a thong-which ended up being the center of her piece adding the element of sensuality to those of motherhood and rest. Named “Mama, All Roads Lead to You” it is an 11×17 3 layer risograph print of a digital collage of photographs taken during her stay. Printed at Print St.Pete, the piece folds into a booklet, and contains the accompanying poem:
What does returning to yourself mean when you have been someone else’s for so long?
*
Mama you deserve the lullaby, the cooked meal, the storytime, kisses on your boo boo even when you’re in pain is inside, you earned that day, those hours, all the minutes to take time for time, to just be still
*
What does returning to yourself mean when you have been someone else’s for so long?
*
Babygirl, yes that body of yours has carried the world,
both in past and present, but you deserve to decide
what will happen going forward.
*
Silk against your skin
Mornings without interruptions
Nights of pleasure
*
Mama you deserve that lullaby.
*
You deserve you back!
…or front, or side
But anew
Mama you deserve you.
*
We know what being gentle does for the spirit , we
practice it everyday
We know what being held feels like, as we are the holders
We know what forgiveness does for the heart; we are the
light for the forgiven.
*
Mama you deserve that lullaby.
*
Gentle bubble baths while a seat is pulled up hearing your
favorite story
The far-off land that feels nothing and everything like
home
You are home and so you can run, as far and as fast as
you can to the light of piece…of play
*
Mama you deserve more than just one day.”
We can’t wait to have Jillian back as a returning resident artist and are so grateful for her fantastic contribution to M.O.M.’s archives.
To learn more about Jillian, her incredible work, and additional publications, please check out this link to her personal website: https://www.jillianmrock.com/
Also be sure to follow her on Insta, FB and Twitter for updates as well as more of her thoughts on our residency!
Instagram: @jillianmrock
Facebook: Jillian M Rock
Twitter: @JillianMRock
If you are interested in applying for a 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.”
As our residency program begins to grow with each new resident, today we would love to highlight previous MOM Art Annex Resident, Psychoanalytic Psychologist Tracy Sidesinger. Tracy also works as a member of the MOM Living Board as our artist residency coordinator.
Those of you who kept up with us regularly on our social media platforms during her residency know about her background as a psychoanalytic psychologist currently practicing virtually from Brooklyn and upstate New York. Her writings and practice focus on gender and sexuality, maternal mental health, spirituality, and the arts. She is also co-founder of The New York Center for Community Psychoanalysis, an emerging nonprofit psychotherapy clinic in Brooklyn which makes psychological care accessible to all as a matter of social justice and equity. If you are interested in her field of study or would like to find out more about her previous work, you can find her writings and publications in Studies in Gender and Sexuality, Journal of Mother Studies, Public Seminar, and Routledge. During her residency, she worked on a collection of essays meant to bridge psychoanalytic insight, interviews, and memoir to bear on the topic of feminine knowing. She confronted topics related to her project, as well as personal feelings on current topics in public discourse that impacted her throughout her residency. As she first acclimated to her stay and mentally prepared herself to write, she felt that having set aside this time to write about the subject of women’s knowing simply caused her to first write about what prevented her from getting to write in the first place. In light of such difficulties, she humorously reflected “why else would one need to write?”
With the additional time, she grew more pensive. As she began to work and write “the feminine,” she reflected that for her it “is knotted even subtly always within the lineage of motherhood “ and “requires some amount of knowing this lineage.” In relation to Sidesinger’s own lineage of motherhood, she reminisced about her maternal grandmother, who lived for nearly 3 decades about an hour’s drive from where she stayed. As she was nearby, and had not returned to the area since her early childhood before her grandmother’s passing, she decided to reconnect and honor her memory by spending a day at her grandmother’s “old haunts.” Memories of their time together came back to Sidesinger, with echoes of her grandmother’s indomitably fierce spirit coming through her memories of their time together, as well as posthumous recognition of her grandmother’s shortcomings as a mother. Despite recognizing such faults, she also recognized that in spite of them, she tried “really fucking hard,”and “survived eight decades when most everyone didn’t care if she lived or died.” Ultimately, through this experience she found strength in the knowledge this new connection provided her regarding her own lineage of motherhood; further assisting her in the research and writing process.
Taking breaks throughout the process to center herself and clear her mind, Sidesinger enjoyed excursions such as kayaking near coastal islands, and found solace in nature between hours of work. She especially focused on the local mangroves, finding they resemble our own growth through the connections we make with others; as we share our stories and grow by doing so, we enter new phases of life. Regardless of how experiences affect us, we continue to form new roots that tangle with those already present. Sidesinger felt this realization allowed her to better write about “the problematic structures of nuclear families” in her manuscript. As the days went by, and her residency drew to a close, she found herself bouncing between 5 different manuscripts and a continuously expanding reading list. However, she felt she had become more in touch with her inner voice, stating she felt she “needed to throw a few things back into the ocean” that would otherwise follow her, like doubt and anger. In this way, like mangroves entangle new roots with the old, she connected her stories to those of others, coming into her own and moving forward into new territory.
To learn more about Tracy, as well her keen insight and work, please check out this link to her personal website: https://nycdepthpsychology.org/
Also be sure to follow her on Instagram: @nycdepthpsychologist
If you are interested in applying for a 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.”
The term ‘maternal’ has been pulsing through the academic and contemporary art worlds. Contemporary art institutions seek to cultivate it; scholars write about it, and artists who become mothers are confronted by the concept.
A confession: it took me a long time to connect to the term maternal. Even after having my baby girl, the term still felt obsolete. The second time around, as a student at Goldsmiths Uni, I started to read about maternal organizations demanding equality and providing agency to those who mother the other. It became really fascinating when I began reading about how scholars, drag, trans, and performance artists were trying to queer the maternal by liberating it by reframing language and traditional thinking about it. As they question the role of community in regard to care practices, open and share the act of mothering, rethink how the maternal can be at use in our society – I began to rethink my own values, production, and artistic process, how I could collaborate and think about mother work differently.
In a webinar hosted by Fred Moten and Stefano Harney held in July 2020, they respond to contemporary political and social disarray. As they note: “Differentiating ourselves through practice is not to identify or disidentify but to continue with the practice, asking questions that are supposed to produce movement and not paralysis.” Inspired by their conversation, the term maternal strategies bubbles up in my thinking. Could the maternal construct a discourse of change? Can it be a strategy for others? And how we might use maternal strategies to reconstruct ourselves, our artistic spaces, words, and our movement to politically vision a different kind of future?
In a constant dialog with these ideas and questions, the different projects I choreograph allow people to go through a process of reflection-loss-re-imagination and yes sometimes it invites them to stay in boredom and uncertainty for a long long time. As the choreographer-the mama of these spatial performative attempts, I use maternal strategies to reorganize and to facilitate. I apply a maternal perspective (harmony, balance, sharing of space and resource), taking into consideration where the performance work is performed, the kind of cultural history it holds, the people who are performing, and the kind of knowledge they hold. By facilitating a space that fundamentally recognizes differences in its rhythm, physical actions, social expectation, where there is no leader but a group of people sharing what they know, a space with no hierarchy between objects, bodies, sound, and audience – Is to my opinion a new kind of territory-form-sphere-strategy where alternative knowledge can evolve and new thoughts about people’s body, movement & freedom of choice can be learned.
‘Observation Room Project’ is a practice of slowing down, drawing its strength from the tension between the human subject and its surroundings. it takes into consideration the vital entanglements of one body with other kinds of bodies therefore is relational and maternal in its perspective. Slowness and durational are the two main methodologies through which I created ‘Observation Room’. in reaction to a rapid society, slowness is a way to counter fixed ideas of production, creative processes, individualism, and many more. It enables “a listening”, perhaps even a “healing” space where the form is captured and new learning can happen.
In ‘Stardust’, I reflected on the working reality of artists & mother artists. By presenting this work at Christie’s [Auction House], Stardust showcased active mother artists as the work of art, while investigating the relationship between the viewer – the commodity of art – and the mother artist who produces it. In this performance, each mother artist was for sale. Next to her feet laid a description of who she is, what she does for a living. (Performing: Rosalind Noctor, Vicky Samuel, Alisa Oleva))
In ‘Standing Still’, the relation between space, duration, and movement is intensely magnified, and the viewer is given the chance to enter another realm of consciousness and awareness. This event took place at the Wellcome Collection Museum. For one hour the performers invited the public to take part in standing still together – reflecting on what happens to the mind and body in a moment of stillness (London).
Indeed, when maternal strategies are used and performed by artists they open space to respond to the patriarchal system by offering different voices, movements, and new images where an alternative reality can exist.
Although we cannot simply conserve the idea of maternal and maternal strategies only through observing a performance, a drag show, an image, or an exhibition, we can perhaps begin to accumulate, through the deconstruction of words, participation in liminal spaces, sharing of invisible maternal experiences, acting with intention, recognizing M-others, maternal actions that mean so much to this society.
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