Mommy
Motherhood was conceived in early 2023 when Freddie and I first began to discuss the possibility of a show in London. Not counting the seven hours spent this summer stranded in Gatwick, I have never been to England, but as a child with access to cable I have spent a majority of my time imagining life as a British orphan. American children in school are taught several things but chief among them is that we are of a freed, liberated and righteous nation with a very dark(sometimes literally in terms of the skin tones of many of the people) history. We have triumphed over tyranny and in doing so, by valiantly rising above unrelenting oppression from thousands of miles away (to say nothing about crowning) have thus provided this world with a lesson on self worth. In other words, this triumph defines us. It is how we began. Born screaming, as a nation the story is that as Americans we have emerged from a cruel and condescending authority figure and from this emergence were able to forge our own rebellious path. Spurning the old ways and shepherding democracy throughout its most vulnerable infancy, raising this one so that we’re nothing like our parents, ...a Freudian dynamic was born.
With regards to my own parents, although they immigrated to New York in the sixties and seventies, they are both from countries that at the time of their births were still considered English colonies. They then left these separate countries for another former colony of England (although it should be said that it’s very hard to go anywhere without bumping into one) and this shadowy matriarchal phantom of a nation followed them throughout their lives haunting and manifesting itself and its fashions in myriads of unseemly and non-benign ways. A quick anecdote as proof: once in second grade my mother was helping me with my homework and spelled color the wrong way. I yelled at her “get that U out of there!”, vulgarities with no end.
Really quickly about the exhibition: butterflies are miracles and phenomenons that happen every day. They are also gross, horrific and very hard to look at up close. The cocoon is vulgarities with no end. a terrifying place where some scholars say liquefaction occurs. Apparently if you cut one open at the right (or wrong) time, some form of goo drips out. Similarly, being taken (and carried)over by the English (or any European power for that matter) was also a gross and terrifying affair,as is learning English to some. Another point: the quilts are indispensable from their titles and references: Princess refers to the 1997 Beanie Babie memorializing the passing of PrincessDiana produced by American toy company Ty, Nurseryis a very large indulgence of a play on words and Mum’s House, covered with words from the Dolch word list, highlights the initial building blocks and structures of literacy and language. With America stuck on its glorious come up and the cultural waters of Jamaica and Trinidad already contaminated by its former landlord/developer, and the estrangement of Africa a topic for another time (a multi-foliated joke hereabout free labor), England remains a blaring constant. Like millions of people throughout the world, the cultural genetics of my being can in some shape or form be attributed to England, which has brought me to the conclusion that England or the UK or Great Britain might as well bemommy, or mother, or mum. Nestling within that same pram of logic: as a writer living in an English speaking country who reads books and talks to friends and orders off menus and responds to messages on dating apps, and enjoys doing it all, every day (and essay) might aswell be Mother’s Day. - Justin Chance
.jpg)
.jpg)
.jpg)
