We Lived In The Gaps Between The Stories is a participatory artwork celebrating the labor of abortion providers, midwives, healers, herbalists, doulas, clinic escorts, and all who care for abortion seekers. In a reciprocal act of labor, the artist works with Cincinnati florist Patricia Campos, herbalist Ellie Mae Mitchell, growers Village General and Camp Washington Urban Farm, and chef Madeline Ndambakuwa to create a series of public programs using abortifacients and emmenagogues (plants with contraceptive properties). Visitors are invited to contribute to the project by writing thank you letters and co-creating a communal wreath displayed at Wave Pool Gallery. Abortion workers are then honored in a gratitude ceremony where they are presented with individual wreaths and a collective poem recognizing their work.

We Lived In The Gaps Between The Stories was made for the inaugural Vance Waddell artist residency, in which a selected artist creates a new work in conversation with pieces from the Sara M. & Michelle Vance Waddell Collection. Alongside my solo show, the gallery will be exhibiting Andrea Bowers’ Wall of Letters: Necessary Reminders from the Past for a Future of Choice, which inspired this project.

PUBLIC PROGRAM

Letters For A Future Of Choice: Writing as Spell-Casting & Radical Gratitude
Witchcare: Plant Medicine & Reproductive Justice
Exhibition Opening with Communal Letter-Writing & Wreath-Making
Feminist Craft Night: Wreath-Making With Abortion Plants
Artist Talk & Reception with Herbal Menu

We Lived In The Gaps Between The Stories has been generously funded by Wave Pool Gallery, Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry, Ohio Arts Council, and Carnegie Mellon University’s GuSH Research Grant.