Production & Reproduction: One Artist's Experience As A Mother & An Artist

By Susan Bence

Published June 27, 2019 at 7:12 PM CDT

1 of 8

A drawing from artist Makeal Flammini's show, which is currently at the Haggerty Museum of Art.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

2 of 8

A drawing from artist Makeal Flammini's show, which is currently at the Haggerty Museum of Art.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

3 of 8

Katie Martin-Meurer, also a mother, created this piece during her 2016 Nohl fellowship. She and others who are also artists and mothers gathered for a chat on Thursday night.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

4 of 8

Katie Martin-Meurer, also a mother, created this piece during her 2016 Nohl fellowship. She and others who are also artists and mothers gathered for a chat on Thursday night.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

5 of 8

Artist and mother Brooke Thiele created this piece as a 2017 Nohl fellow.

Mary L Nohl Fund

6 of 8

Artist and mother Brooke Thiele created this piece as a 2017 Nohl fellow.

Mary L Nohl Fund

7 of 8

Kim Miller, a 2009 Nohl fellow, is both an artist and mom.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

8 of 8

Kim Miller, a 2009 Nohl fellow, is both an artist and mom.

Mary L. Nohl Fund

Makeal Flammini is a 2018 Mary L. Nohl Fund Fellowships For Individual Artists' recipient. Flammini has two young children, and she describes herself as a mom who hasn't slept in four years.

Artist Makeal Flammini describes herself as a mother who hasn't slept in four years.

Flammini's work, along with that of all of the Nohl fellows, is currently on view at the Haggerty Museum of Art. Her show, titled ‘How About I Eat You’, was inspired by a dream Flammini's daughter shared with her.

“All of these animals were chasing her home from school and she was really scared. But then she turned around and looked at the cheetah and said, How about I eat you,” Flammini says. “I think that’s just so amazing to turn on a predator and say maybe I’m powerful, maybe I’ll east you instead.”

Flammini says her show chronicles her reckoning with who she was before being a mom and after. “I don’t think I was ever beholden to anything before I had kids. If I had a plant and it died, I could just throw it outside,” Flammini says.