Performing Everyday Maternal Practice: Activist Structures in Creative Work

Abstract

This article is summarising few key issues that were raised during the conference Motherhood and Creative practice: Maternal Structures in creative work that took place in June 2015, at London South Bank University. The need for intergenerational discussion on maternal reality, solidarity and encounter as concepts in creative practice, and feminism emerged strongly during the event. There is a gradual yet sustained increase in creative practices, which, starting from the challenges posed by the above concepts, explore the maternal everyday experience in various mediums and formats. In addition to this, many young artists at the conference insisted on presence and visibility of the maternal body as a vital form of resistance to the invisibility and silencing of maternal creative work. There is a reinvigorated interest in feminist mothering and strengthening the social, personal, and political power of mothers through activists’ performative interventions. Art in their case is a materialization or public manifestation of the creativity that underlies the maternal everyday experience.