Expected
I read “What to Expect When You're Expecting” when pregnant with my first child. Rather than be reassured, I was overwhelmed with gendered expectations, and anxiety around my changing body. My artist book Expecting looks to challenge the prescriptive nature of pregnancy guides, decentering the notion of “one right way” to give birth and instead documents my individual embodied experience.
The altered artist book, a wax encased original copy of “What to Expect”, contains an opening of 10cm, the dilation of the cervix at birth. This tactile void acknowledges the voices and experiences often missing in the mainstream dialogue, and also opens space for new ways of knowing and communicating reproductive narratives. Contained within are two original works— one a poem from the pages of the original, highlighted to offer an alternative to traditional advice. The other is an intimate photographic story of my first birth, offering a window into the somatic experience that is beyond words.