Shot / Counter Shot: Self-portrait as a mother. Grimsby Art Gallery Commission, Digital print on Hahnemuhle, Editioned print, 47 x 61 cm. 2018.

This work was created by commission for the Grimsby Public Art Gallery, for their project Ripple Effect, that invited artists to create a work in response to a work in their collection. Titled Shot / Counter Shot: Self-portrait as mother is made in response to Lupe Rodriguez’s wonderful painting, The Arrival of Liam (1985). I was struck by Lupe’s sense of colour in her painting and her choice to depict a bull as a representation of herself as a mother. She made the work after the arrival of her second child, and I pondered her painting 3 ½ years after the birth of my second child. After spending some time with the painting, I continued to ponder the work. What does it mean to select a bull, obviously male, to represent a mother? I loved the idea of the force of motherhood as being something beyond gender. When I think of Lupe’s image, I feel it does work as a representation of motherhood as I too feel like I am massive, barely tamed, a more-than-human-animal able to erupt into sheer force at any second.

Suddenly it seemed obvious that my image needed to be an almost filmic response, the shot / counter shot strategy we see in narrative film, where one character looks one way, and the shot peers over their shoulder, towards a second character. In the next shot, the second character in dialogue looks back at the camera in an almost perfect 180-degree axis. This suture is magical: we transcend time and space, pinning two into a fictional exchange. My bison is looking back at her bull.

As I drew the bison, I spent a lot of time and attention trying to elicit the texture of the fur, as motherhood involves the proximal senses, and touch is central. These colours echo a part of Lupe’s painting that posits fuchsia and orange beside each other. It struck me as the flamboyant approach to colour that Marilyn I. Walker had, and I chose this colour combination to honour her as a mother to our community, who created a fantastic art school in our city’s core, that I am thankful for daily. As a mother and as an artist I live in a world of colour.