When I was going in for an abortion (D&C), I brought my camera to calm myself and distract myself from
the procedure. My husband and I had been pregnant, and the fetus had died. We are at the age where
we need help to get pregnant. Like many couples today, we have focused on our careers until suddenly,
we are on the edge of not being able to conceive. A Work in Progress is a documentation of the
continuous struggle of a couple trying to create a child. The stage is not only in the doctor's office but also
in the spaces of pause along the way before and after (garages, lobbies, bedrooms, and outdoor spaces).
A Work in Progress is a meditation and a calming reprieve from medical procedures and visits that create a
rhythmic presence in a patient's life. This project is taken from the visual scope of myself as the patient. The
camera becomes a therapeutic element, documenting instances of order that quietly verge on chaos. The
oscillation between order and chaos, loneliness and partnership, and inner and outer space speaks to
human experience and time. The concrete engine instigates this body of work is the ongoing visits to
medical facilities that become rituals, creating intimate waiting spaces.
As reproductive rights have been slowly and systematically dismantled, this work has found life in what their
past rights were. Though the images were taken in 2012, they were edited and printed for an exhibition at
the University of Dayton in 2022. This not-so-distant past is what we long to have back: the ability to take
care of our bodies and the medical community to do this.
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