M.A.D.R.E.
Doris Lessing, Under my skin: volume one of My Autobiography, 1994
There is no boredom like that of an intelligent young woman who spends all day with a very small child.
My children cause me the most exquisite suffering of which I have any experience. It is the suffering of ambivalence: the murederous alternation between bitter resentment and raw-edged nerves, and blissful gratification and tenderness.
Adrienne Rich, Of Woman Born, 1976
M.A.D.R.E. is a long-term project (2019-2022) that through photos and texts investigates the experience of motherhood in contemporary European society, to challenge the sugar-coated image that is proposed to us of this and begin to break down the stereotypes of gender roles within the family. When I became a mother for the second time, I felt like I no longer existed as an individual. I felt lost, and I wondered if others felt the same way.
In 2019 I began photographing mothers with their children in their home context, choosing a documentary approach, positioning myself as a “neutral observer”, and ccomparing myself with them on this experience. I discovered that I was not the only one with ambivalent feelings about my family role, and to ask myself: why is no one talking about it openly? Why hadn’t anyone warned me? And if we started talking about it openly , maybe that would help other women to feel less alone?
An extract from M.A.D.R.E. has been published online by Perimetro in 2024
