The name “The ART of Infertility” has a double meaning. The artwork, created by women struggling with infertility, and Assisted Reproductive Technologies, the medical treatments that help those struggling to become parents. It is also a play on the word “artifact” and the numerous medical objects that can accumulate from going through infertility. IF also has a double meaning. IF is the acronym for infertility. It is also a common word that infertility patients use as they live the limbo that infertility forces them into as their schedules are controlled by fertility treatments.
Today we feature some art that reimagines, reinterprets and repurposes some medical art-i-facts to tell part of their infertility story. When the exhibit travels, these are always some exhibit favorites. They are powerful and tell the truth – infertility hurts and infertility is hard. But going through infertility reminds you also of what matters, what is important, and what is inspiring. We hope a few of these pieces will leave you inspired.
“Letting Go” by Denise Callen.
Denise explains “Letting Go” as: From childhood,, we are brought up to believe in a traditional fairytale of how our lives will unfold: meet the handsome prince who steals the fair maiden’s heart, marry and have a beautiful family. It can be a rude awakening when life veers from that path. Every plan I made revolved around this traditional view of how life was to play out. I married a wonderful man; we bought the perfect house with room for the traditional 2.5 children, and then the dream took us down a very dark path we never anticipated. Years of trying, expensive treatments over and over and over and over again, took their toll. Just when we would get good news, our hopes would be dashed with miscarriages and no heartbeats. I reached a point when it was time to stop crying, injecting, treatment and pouring money into a dream that wasn’t to be. I needed to let go of the fantasy and find a new dream. I am now putting the pieces of my life together. Like this work, it is still beautiful and holds parts of the past, but it is very different from the original plan. No matter how hard I try to patch it together, it, and I, will never be the same. I am stronger. I am wiser. I am happy. I am sad. I am living child-free.
Failed IVF #1 (September 10, 2015 – October 9, 2015) by Sara Nelson.
Sara explains “Failed IVF#1 (September 10, 2015-October 9, 2015)” as: I often use my own body in my images. Molding it and adhering it to my canvas. Creating forms that are not perfect yet are perfect in their own right. In “Failed IVF#1 (September 10, 2015-October 9, 2015)”, I strive to bring the viewer into the overwhelming world that is infertility at its most extreme, the process of in vitro fertilization. It is an insanely overwhelming process, full of medications, needles, doctor visit, surgeries, extremely high highs, and often extremely devastatingly low lows. In this piece, I have used the needles I used throughout my entire IVF treatment. I have pierced them back into a cast of my own body; in the locations I put the initial injections, day in, day out, day in, day out, hoping to help my doctor to create a perfect, viable embryo to become my child. Unfortunately, the process resulted only in the picture you see; one tiny dot of an embryo that was probably not healthy, and did not make it to become a viable human being. I am still grieving that loss and that failure. After finishing the piece, with the help of my amazing and wonderful husband, I could not help but think, I have to do this again. I have to try again. I am not ready to give up. I WILL have an IVF#2, however emotionally and financially draining it is. Hopefully this will end in success.
“Infertility Armour” by Elizabeth Walker.
Elizabeth explains “Infertility Armour” as: Amber and pearls are my go-to gems. While I was trying to conceive, I developed some superstitions. One was that I had to wear amber every day or it may change my energy and decrease my chances of getting pregnant. This was unusual for me because I strongly put my faith in science. However, while undergoing treatment for my infertility, science was letting me down. I created this piece of infertility armorusing needles and syringes identical to the ones my husband used to give me progesterone in oil shots. The shots were one of the things I feared most about IVF but it turned out they weren’t as horrible as I imagined they might be. The amber, while a fashion staple for me, is also a nod to the amber teething necklaces for babies that became popular while I was trying to get pregnant. I felt slighted because amber was MY stone and everyone else was buying it for their babies when I couldn’t have one. The pearls are also the bead that I assigned to progesterone shots in previous projects. When cycling, progesterone keeps your uterine lining in check for your embryo to be able to implant and grow. I imagined this like the lining of mother of pearl inside a shell, or the protective layer that oysters form around a foreign object which becomes a pearl.