Collective insights from a diverse and global group of contemporary artists whose works challenge traditional representations of motherhood Picturing Motherhood Now brings together work by a range of contemporary artists who reimagine the possibilities for representing motherhood. Drawing on a range of feminisms, this exhibition catalogue challenges familiar archetypes of motherhood, construing motherhood as a multivalent term. The artists in the catalogue see motherhood as a lens through which to examine contemporary social issues. While focusing on art made in the past two decades, the catalogue also integrates work by significant pioneers, narrating an intergenerational and evolving story. This richly illustrated volume features painting, sculpture, photography, and installations by 30 contemporary artists, including Njideka Akunyili Crosby, Latoya Ruby Frazier, Titus Kaphar, and Aliza Nisenbaum, alongside works by feminist pioneers who inspired them, such as Louise Bourgeois, Alice Neel, and Betye Saar. Scholarly essays examine dimensions of matrilineage and contemporary art, enlarging our understanding of motherhood in today's culture. The catalogue also includes a roundtable conversation among artists and thinkers, animating the themes of the exhibition through a dynamic exchange.

Who was your mother before she was a mother? Essays and photos from Brit Bennett, Jennifer Egan, Danzy Senna, Laura Lippman, Jia Tolentino, and many more. In this remarkable collection, New York Times–bestselling novelist Edan Lepucki gathers more than sixty original essays and favorite photographs to explore this question. The daughters in Mothers Before are writers and poets, artists and teachers, and the images and stories they share reveal the lives of women in ways that are vulnerable and true, sometimes funny, sometimes sad, and always moving. Contributors include: Brit Bennett * Jennine Capó Crucet * Jennifer Egan * Angela Garbes * Annabeth Gish * Alison Roman * Lisa See * Danzy Senna * Dana Spiotta * Lan Samantha Chang * Laura Lippman * Jia Tolentino * Tiffany Nguyen * Charmaine Craig * Maya Ramakrishnan * Eirene Donohue * and many others

Do you wish you had a photographic record of your family but don't know where to start? Turn the everyday into the extraordinary with renowned photographer and blogger Tracey Clark's guide to documenting motherhood. Each day of a mother's life is full of photographic potential, and Elevate the Everyday shows you how to take ordinary moments and turn them into memorable and lasting photographs. With a host of creative ideas, technical tips, stories of motherhood, and inspirational images that go far beyond traditional posed shots, Tracey shows you how to unlock your creativity and document your family the way they are right now. - Accessible advice on camera settings, composition, and more, to help ensure that photographing your family is made easy - Creative and easy ways to turn your daily routine with your children into opportunities for great photography - Inspirational stories and images from Tracey herself as well as from an exceptional community of mothers who are also photographers, writers, and bloggers

A raw, funny, and fiercely honest account of becoming a mother before feeling like a grown up. When Meaghan O'Connell got accidentally pregnant in her twenties and decided to keep the baby, she realized that the book she needed -- a brutally honest, agenda-free reckoning with the emotional and existential impact of motherhood -- didn't exist. So she decided to write it herself. And Now We Have Everything is O'Connell's exploration of the cataclysmic, impossible-to-prepare-for experience of becoming a mother. With her dark humor and hair-trigger B.S. detector, O'Connell addresses the pervasive imposter syndrome that comes with unplanned pregnancy, the fantasies of a "natural" birth experience that erode maternal self-esteem, post-partum body and sex issues, and the fascinating strangeness of stepping into a new, not-yet-comfortable identity. Channeling fears and anxieties that are still taboo and often unspoken, And Now We Have Everything is an unflinchingly frank, funny, and visceral motherhood story for our times, about having a baby and staying, for better or worse, exactly yourself. Smart, funny, and true in all the best ways, this book made me ache with recognition." -- Cheryl Strayed

The pathbreaking investigation into motherhood and womanhood from an influential and enduring feminist voice, now for a new generation. In Of Woman Born, originally published in 1976, influential poet and feminist Adrienne Rich examines the patriarchic systems and political institutions that define motherhood. Exploring her own experience—as a woman, a poet, a feminist, and a mother—she finds the act of mothering to be both determined by and distinct from the institution of motherhood as it is imposed on all women everywhere. A “powerful blend of research, theory, and self-reflection” (Sandra M. Gilbert, Paris Review), Of Woman Born revolutionized how women thought about motherhood and their own liberation. With a stirring new foreword from National Book Critics Circle Award–winning writer Eula Biss, the book resounds with as much wisdom and insight today as when it was first written.

Mother Truths is a beautiful, funny, and raw collection of poetry about early motherhood. The perfect gift for expectant mothers and new mums.

Images, representations and constructions of mothers have historically shaped and continue to shape the way we imagine the institution of motherhood and the experience of mothering. The various contributions included in this volume consider the diversity of maternal images and narratives that circulate in literature, the arts and popular culture and analyse how they reflect on and influence the cultural meaning of motherhood in the contemporary era. Mindful of the fact that the images of motherhood that we see in popular media, on television, and in literature are not mere background noise to our daily lives, the various chapters explore how they influence our understanding of what it means to be a mother, affect our expectations of motherhood and of mothers, frame our experience of mothering, and even inform our reproductive decisions. Including insights from media studies, cultural studies, literary studies, and the performing and visual arts, this book explores how engaging with diverse representations of mothers and mothering contributes to a broader and deeper interdisciplinary understanding of how motherhood is constructed in our time. The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of the journal Women: A Cultural Review.