Mother Figure

“Mother Figure” re-stages maternal relationships through reenacted memories and desires, using touch and gesture to explore care, gender roles, and childhood wounds. The series blurs documentary and fantasy to reimagine “mothering” beyond biological ties.

“Mother Figure” is a series of photographs in which I invite participants to pose with me as a stand-in for their mother. These encounters probe constructed notions of gender roles and family structures while surfacing childhood wounds and existential fears. Drawing inspiration from psychodrama – a therapeutic method where past experiences are restaged – the photographs hover between documentary and fantasy, blurring the line between personal history and performative intervention.

Through a visual emphasis on touch and gesture, the photographs capture the complex spectrum of experiences we have with caregivers – intimacy and security, tension and neglect, attachment and eroticism. By embodying the role of the maternal figure myself, I create a space where participants can both reenact and reimagine their own experiences of mothering, inviting tenderness, discomfort, and play.

The project emerged from my personal conflict over not having biological children and an interest to explore forms of “mothering” that exist beyond parenthood. I am curious how the act of re-staging our memories, desires, and wounds around motherhood can open new possibilities for understanding and transforming our most foundational relationships, as well as broadening my own understanding of “mothering.”