Claudia Pharés: Strategies, single parenting and covid-19

9 Jun

**Hold**, 2018. Fiber-based handprint, 80cm x 100 cm.

Q: Firstly, tell us about yourself! Where do you live, what sort of art do you make and how many children do you have?

A: I’m originally from Montreal (Canada) and I’ve been living in Melbourne (Australia) since 2006. I came to Australia on a working/holiday visa back in 2005. While traveling and working as a nurse, I met an Australian man and decided to stay.

Since then, we got married and had 2 children. Our relationship ended in 2017 and I’ve been the primary carer of my children (now 5 and 7) ever since.

My art practice has been largely inspired my life-changing events that have challenged my sense of self and my sense of control. I’ve used photography sculptures, installation and video work to explore issues with femininity, infertility, womanhood, and motherhood through a feminist lens.

Q: How do you continue to engage with your art practice alongside raising children? Do you have a dedicated studio space and routine, or do you work from home in between other things?

A: Between 2011-2019, I was enrolled at the same university (University of Melbourne) where I completed a bachelor’s degree in Fine Arts, an Honors Degree in Fine Arts and recently a Master’s Degree in Fine Arts. I went on maternity leave twice.

Having been in an institution gave me the structure, the stability and the community I needed to support me as an artist, a mother, and a woman.

My ongoing research on art and motherhood has been my lifeline especially when I experience a difficult marriage that lead to a challenging divorce. It empowered me as an artist and a mother.

At the university, I used all the available facilities (workshop, darkroom, pouring/sculpture room) to create my work. I always had my own studio space on site until last year.

Where I work really depends on the project. At home, I’ve used my kitchen table and a spare room to make work.

I learned to work around my children’s school and kinder schedules. I try not to use babysitters unless I really need to.

I can get most things done with a lot of organization while leaving some room for the imponderable. I went back to work as a nurse since 2017 and that fills up my schedule quickly. When the children are at their dad’s, I make time for fitness, art, work, chilling out, and socializing. I try to do everything which is often unsustainable!

I always work best with schedules and deadlines.

Q: What does a typical day look like for you and how much time do you manage to carve out for your own work?

A: It really depends on what’s going on at the moment. I’ve been homeschooling the children for the most part since the end of March 2020. My paid work as a nurse was up in the air for a while.

My art residency was postponed. My art show at a public library was also postponed. I successfully hosted a dinner event online a few weeks ago, ‘Sharing is Caring’, in collaboration with a local artist-run-gallery, Bus Project. The online dinner event was an opportunity to connect with others while sharing the same meal. My recipe was posted online prior to the event so participants could prepare the same dish. It was an alternative to the ‘real’ dinner. The original plan was to cook for the audience in a gallery space.

Raising children or caring for others while maintaining an art practice makes it difficult to attend art events when a lot of networking takes place. My practice involves engaging the public to create connections, especially for artist/parents. I’ve conducted similar socially-engaged events in the past where children and parents were invited to participate in a workshop together.

**Strategies**, Installation view, 2019.

Q: Have you come up against specific challenges as an artist and mother? What were they and how have you navigated these challenges?

A: Being a single parent without family support means having to be adaptable and ready for any last-minute changes. During self-isolation, I have been confronted with some profound eye-opening experiences. Spending that much time with my children enabled me to understand them and myself better. I don’t think I would have made these self-discoveries if it wasn’t for COVID-19.

My art practice has experienced some shifting since my Masters’ completion. Being out of institution is a bit like leaving the nest. Where to go from here? How to keep the momentum going?

I’ve presented twice my research project early this year: once at a Social Activism conference and another at a Research Conference. I felt empowered to speak about my research project entitled ‘Strategies: A Mother Artist Maintenance Manifesto’. Shedding light on the importance of mothering as a discipline in a patriarchal society is important to me. I find it motivating to challenge the construct of what it means to be a mother in the society I live in. Lately, I have realized I needed to find alternate means to share my feminist artistic endeavors in social isolation. The virtual dinner event was one.

There are times when I felt guilty working on my art practice. I feel I’m not prioritizing my responsibilities towards my children. Then again, my art practice is about maintaining an art practice while mothering. Now that my studio is at home, I don’t feel as guilt-ridden. Another solution I found was to keep myself surrounded with other artists/parents or supportive friends. Uni was great for this!

My biggest challenge is to not overstretch myself trying to do everything or feel like I have to be in the limelight all the time. It’s easy to fall into the trap of wanting to be in numerous art exhibitions and also wanting to be present at all the kids’ school activities. It’s unhealthy and unrealistic. With COVID-19, things have slowed down to a halt; taking off the pressure a bit gives me the opportunity to reassess and take care of myself better.

Q: What is the best piece of advice you have been given?

A: “Take care of yourself!” It’s so easy to be caught up in the general caring of the children while having to work a job. I’ve been so stretched out at times and it can really affect my coping mechanisms with basic day-to-day challenges if I don’t slow down.

Q: Who are your role models? Who or what inspires and encourages you?

A: I have a close friend, Azza Zein, here in Melbourne whom I’ve met while we were both enrolled in a Bachelors in Fine Arts Program in 2011. She and I clicked and we’ve been very supportive of one another since then. We have a lot in common too.

We are both expats and are both of similar cultural backgrounds and we both have a professional career besides our artistic career. We are both mothers and we both completed out Masters in Fine Art together last year. She encouraged me to pursue post-graduate studies and I am very grateful for that.

I am definitely drawn to like-minded individuals who enjoy culture, food, political issues, and of course, art. I forged stronger relationships with old friends and made some new friendships since I’ve become a single mother. It’s important for me that my children witness that there are friends that love me, support me and respect me as an artist, as a feminist, as woman, and as a mother.

I am also inspired by artists who explore social issues such as violence, racism, politics, sexism, anthropocentrism, social inequality. Some examples include Teresa Margolles, Vanessa Godden, Ilene Sova, Carrie Mae Weems, Marjane Sartrapi, Rosi Braidotti, bell hooks, etc. Using any form of art to critic social issues requires a certain level of fearlessness and passion which I find admirable.

Q: How has the experience of motherhood impacted your practice on an emotional/intellectual level? Has it made you view yourself/your work differently? Are there things that influence your work now that you didn't think about pre-kids?

A: Becoming a mother made me more aware of the social constructs surrounding motherhood. It strengthened my feminist values and made me an advocate for promoting mothering as a discipline. I believe that one is not born a mother, one becomes one through learning and critical thinking. Same for being an artist; you learn as you practice.

When I became a mother, I experienced a re-birth. I am re-learning how to see the world through my children’s eyes. I also been revisiting some confronting childhood memories. This made me realize that you can’t underestimate the influence your parents have had on your own parenting. Self-isolation taught me to be a better mother.

Speaking of being a parent, I found I lost my sense of privacy when I became one. It is similar to losing control in a way. I made a body of work exploring the desire for escapism or for voluntary isolation. In inhabiting structures I’ve built, I could perform self-isolation. I could also isolate myself as a statement to highlight my existence as an underrecognized member of society, the mother.

Little did I know that 4 years down the track, we would all be performing self-isolation.

These days, my daughter took over my Tent to create her own private space. My son, on the other hand, took over a little house I built.

Q: If your child(ren) were asked “Tell me about your mother” what do you hope they would say? Are there particular things you are trying to show/teach them as an artist, a mother, a woman?

A: I’d like them to say that I’m an artist and a nurse. I want to project that there are opportunities for all different kind of interests. And you can pursue your passions with dedication and perseverance. I’d like for them to learn that we all deserved to feel respected, supported and loved. I would like to have a feminist approach to life. To be grateful for experiences, good and bad.

Q: What drives you to continue to create work?

A: To problem solve.