Episode 15 - Do We Forget the Babysitter?: An Artist Residency in Motherhood, Collectively
“I think if you're just starting to listen within, then An Artist Residency in Motherhood can be a quiet space to let those ideas come to the surface and then have uninterrupted time to pursue those ideas.”
~ Cindy DiTiberio
A wonderful resource that's come up on the podcast is the Artist Residency in Motherhood organization, which artist and mother, Lenka Clayton started in 2012. Kaitlin didn't know much about the organization until last year(2021) when a fellow writer and mother, Amanda Montei mentioned it in a class of hers Kaitlin was taking, and then alerted the class of a Facebook group that was spawned out of this residency.
Kaitlin joined the group and was linked up with a Bay Area group of caregiver artists whose work runs in and around topics of motherhood and art in the modern era.
In an attempt to capture some of the zeitgest of one of their most recent residency gatherings, Kaitlin set up a recording space so each participant could weigh in on their experiences and thoughts of the collective residency in real-time.
This group includes Amanda Montei, herself. Amanda is the author of Touched Out: Motherhood, Misogyny, Consent, and Control, forthcoming from Beacon Press in 2023! She is also the author of the memoir Two Memoirs and the chapbook The Failure Age. Her essays can be found in Mother Tongue, Slate, Electric Literature, Vox, the Rumpus, Salon, Ms. Magazine, and others. Her Substack, Mad Moms: A newsletter about the cultural, political, and personal stories that shape our bodies, our selves, and our work, is definitely required reading.
Writer, editor and collaborator Cindy DiTiberio has worked in the publishing industry for over 20 years, first as an editor at HarperOne and then as a ghostwriter for eleven books. She is the Publisher of Literary Mama and also authors a cutting and really insightful Substack called The Mother Lode, a newsletter that “...helps mothers feel seen while doing the invisible yet necessary work of caretaking.”
The group also includes Patti Maciesz, a Polish-American artist and writer based in Oakland, California whose artistic projects like Bill The Patriarchy, are groundbreaking art meets activism.
Finally, Minna Dubin, a writer, workshop facilitator, and occasional public artist living in Berkeley, California. Her writing on Mom Rage in the New York Times found widespread readership and became the basis for her memoir of the same title, also out next year.
This episode is the result of these collective voices, which feels like a dreamscape of the artist-mother mind of what residencies afford those of us privileged enough to build the time and space into our lives, to devote ourselves solely to our artistic and creative pursuit.
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More on Amanda Montei:
Website: https://www.amandamontei.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amontei/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/amanda.montei
Twitter: https://twitter.com/AmandaMontei
Mad Moms Substack: https://madmoms.substack.com/
Amanda’s writing classes: https://www.amandamontei.com/teaching
More on Cindy DiTiberio:
Website: https://www.cynthiaditiberio.com/
The Mother Lode Substack: https://cindyditiberio.substack.com/
The Literary Mama Magazine: https://literarymama.com/
Instagram: http://instagram.com/cindy.ditiberio
Twitter: https://twitter.com/CindyDT
More on Patti Maciesz:
Bill the Patriarchy: https://www.billthepatriarchy.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/artpatti/
Website: https://www.artpatti.com/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/pattimaciesz
More on Minna Dubin:
Website: http://minnadubin.com/about/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/minnadubin/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/minnadubin
Related resources
An Artist Residency in Motherhood: http://www.artistresidencyinmotherhood.com/
About Lenka Clayton: http://www.lenkaclayton.com/
Amanda Montei’s classes: https://www.amandamontei.com/teaching
Two Memiors by Amanda Montei: https://bookshop.org/a/86159/9781937543921
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