Woman Holding Balance references the composition of Vermeer’s Woman Holding a Balance, 1663. I have replaced the scale in the woman’s hand with my 2yo son, the pile fabric on the table in front of her with a pile of my children’s laundry, and the Judgement Day painting behind her with Mark Rothko’s Untitled, Black and Grey, 1970 (the year of his passing). 

This work is not only about the physical and mental balancing act of motherhood, but about my balance of love and affection for my two sons. My needs are null and void, I am suffering from depression here (as indicated by the head covering and the Rothko painting which looms over me). I so deeply want to connect lovingly once again with my eldest, my first baby, yet I cannot.