M/other Voices

IT ALL BEGAN as a research project by Deirdre M. Donoghue (artist, Rotterdam) and was initiated at Witte de With Centre for Contemporary Art (NL) in October 2013, continuing on with readings through 2013 to June 2014. The project's aim was and is to reflect on the maternal figure as a thinker and a producer of knowledge, rather than as a subject of representation and as a domestic figure inseparable from human emotions. By considering the maternal as an attitude towards our being-in-the-world, and as a practice held together by an ethos of ultimate hospitality towards ‘the other’, (m)other voices explores relations between maternal work and -experience, -thinking and -time and the production of knowledge within arts and beyond. The project brings together scholars, writers, artists, curators and historians from various corners of the world and takes place through specifically framed human encounters, exchanges and contributions between people from various disciplines and backgrounds. The project is initiated by Deirdre M. Donoghue and is supported by Witte de With Center for Contemporary Art. It was launched in Copenhagen together with Witte de With, the artists collective Oda Projesi (TR) and Astrid Noack’s Ateliers (DK) in the summer 2013, in the frame of The World Turned Inside Out.

IT SINCE HAS BECAME A FOUNDATION: Stichting m/other voices, whose mission statement you can read here:

“Non-profit organisatie met als doel het initiëren, ondersteunen, promoten, bewustmaken en zichtbaarheid geven aan maternaal denken, theorie en onderzoek binnen de kunsten, cultuur, filosofie en samenleving in het algemeen, alsmede het vergroten van de participatie van moeders in de productie van kunst, cultuur en theorie. De stichting onderneemt verschillende activiteiten in het belang van moeders (en iedereen die zich bezighoudt met maternale arbeid) als denkers en als kennisproducenten. Dit wordt bereikt door middel van activiteiten waaronder, maar niet beperkt tot, het organiseren van leesgroepen, excursies, tentoonstellingen, publicaties, maatschappelijk betrokken groepen, dialoog, seminars en conferenties. Voorts houdt de stichting zich bezig met het opbouwen en onderhouden van lokale en internationale gemeenschappen en netwerken tussen maternale hulpverleners, kunstenaars, onderzoekers en anderen die belangstelling hebben in maternale theorie.”