Digital print on Hahnemühle paper.

Digital prints on Hahnemühle paper.

These photos were taken on a Sunday morning in Bray, with my back to the Irish Sea, the same sea so many women would have had to cross to maintain their bodily autonomy. This piece was made before the Referendum.

To Ensure Hope is our Role; Despondere Spem Munus Nostrum; Motto of the Italian Penitentiary Police - Polizia Penitenziaria

Aprons of Power as part of The Artists’ Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment, Repeal! Procession at EVA International Biennale, Limerick, 2018

Episode 1: Who’s Laughing Now? - Fancy Dress in Protest

https://player.fm/series/dress-fancy/ep-01-whos-laughing-now-fancy-dress-in-protest

Image credit; Alison Laredo

Performers; Emma Finucane, Kim Gleeson, Lynn-Marie Dennehy, Nicole Flanagan, Nuala Clarke, Eleanor Phillips.

Aprons of Power as part of The Artists’ Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment, Repeal! Procession at EVA International Biennale, Limerick, 2018

1. Aprons of Power – performance shot – Artists’ campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment Procession – EVA International, Limerick, 2018;
linen, silk, felt, fabric paint, cord, dimensions variable, each apron 85cm x 60cm approx. with hanging cord -

Set of Six Aprons

a) Grace Under Pressure –derived from Hemmingway’s definition of having ‘Guts’ - American Armed Forces.

b) Fortitude Overcomes All Difficulties - Omnia Vincit Animus; Italian Coast Guards - Guardia Costiera

c) To Ensure Hope is our Role; Despondere Spem Munus Nostrum; Italian Penitentiary Police - Polizia Penitenziaria

d) Under the Law Freedom; Sub Lege Libertas; Italian State Police - Polizia di Stato

e) I Remember - Je Me Souviens, Canada, Royal 22nd Regiment – motto changed from Trust Women Repeal after the passing of the Referendum.

f) To Us Nothing Is Impossible - Nos Nihil Efficere Non Possumus, Sweden - Norrland Engineer Company

Image credit; Darren Ryan

The Aprons of Power are held in the Collection of the Arts Council of Ireland.

Aprons of Power as part of The Artists’ Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment, Repeal! Procession at EVA International Biennale, Limerick, 2018

A link to the film of the procession by Mia Mullarkey

The Artists’ Campaign to repeal the Eighth Amendment at the 6th Annual March for Choice organised by ARC, Dublin 2018.

Banners by Alice Maher, Breda Mayock, Sarah Cullen, Aine Phillips and Rachel Fallon

image credit; Christian Kerskens

The Artists’ Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment was founded by artists Cecily Brennan, Eithne Jordan, Alice Maher and poet Paula Meehan in 2015. it called for a repeal of Article 40.3.3 of the Irish Constitution which equated the life of a pregnant person with that of the foetus which effectively banned abortion. it was repealed in 2018 following a referendum.

https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2018/apr/12/the-hateful-eighth-artists-frontline-ireland-abortion-rights-battle-eighth-amendment

‘The Map’ is a collaborative work by Rachel Fallon and Alice Maher. Along with the accompanying text/ sound work ‘We Are The Map” by Sinéad Gleeson and Stephen Shannon, it originally formed part of ‘The Magdalene Series’, an exhibition program curated and commissioned by MaolÍosa Boyle which sought to consider the historical and cultural figure of Mary Magdalene as a powerful motif for varying explorations of language, agency, autonomy, colonialism, and institutionalization.

Maher and Fallon first met on the Artist’s Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment, as part of the Campaign for Reproductive Rights in Ireland, where they contributed to the making of a set of original street banners which were carried on marches and processions and became synonymous with the success of that ground-breaking social movement. 

‘The Map’ is an extension of this spirit of collective endeavour and a continuation of their interest in mobile forms of art which can communicate to people on many different levels.  Along with this material and historical reference, the artists also brought an interest in cartography into their exploration of the Magdalene in all her societal, mythological and personal meaning.

‘The Map’ (6.50m x 4m) sewn, hand embroidered, embellished, crocheted and painted by both over a three-year period, is a monumental textile sculpture. Approaching the subject through the lens of the feminist cartography, in which the elements of the practice of mapping are used as a device to imagine and re-imagine the life, legacy and mythology of the Magdalene and its impact on women’s lives, they utilised the iconography of renaissance maps and medieval tapestries, as well as the language of Victorian ‘Cartes de Tendre’ and moral schemas such as ‘the Pilgrim's Progress’, to subvert and challenge the very belief systems and power structures that these maps were established to uphold.

With its own continents, winds, currents and constellations, ‘The Map’ draws the viewer in, inviting a reorientation. Its richly worked surface is an epic Mappa Mundi where an alternative topographic and psychic landscape is uncovered.

6.2m x 3.8m - mixed media textile - Rachel Fallon and Alice Maher 2021

installation at Rua Red Gallery, South County Dublin Arts Centre as part of The Magdalene Series

image credit: Ros Kavanagh

Image credit: Ros Kavanagh

10m x 60cm knitted yarn, foam mirror.

A thing that is accepted as true or certain to happen, without proof, or the action of taking on power or responsibility - climbing the ladder so to speak or the reception of the Virgin Mary bodily into heaven.
In Mid-14th Century Europe paintings of the Madonna and Child began to be appear where the Virgin Mary was depicted knitting. There doesn’t seem to be any particular reason for this apart from the fact that knitting was becoming popular among women in wealthier households. There is no historical evidence Mary knit as the oldest double needled knitted artefacts presently known only date back to 11th century Egypt - socks, previous to that a technique known as nalbinding (more like sewing in loops) was used (250 -450AD, Egypt). Knitting guilds, origins in 14th Century developed with Master craftsmen and journeyman apprentices spreading techniques and a wall piece from one such guild depicts Jacobs Ladder as a motif. Jacobs Ladder being the biblical connection between heaven and earth, it’s also a type of rope ladder used on boats, german word for it is strick leiter but ‘strick’ is the word also used for knitting or for a noose.

The Miraculous Assumption is a reference to the belief that Holy Mary was ‘assumed in her bodily entirety’ into heaven once her earthly life was done. It is seen as an escape for Mary after the death of Jesus referred to in eastern christianity as the Dormition or “falling asleep” to be resurrected. Here in the land of ‘career ladders’ and ‘housing ladders’ children and being pregnant is either a boom (seldom) or a burden and depending on where you start from it is possible or impossible to get any higher.

wool felt, embroidery threads, household sponges

These medals came about through looking at pronatalist movements in fascist/ totalitarian regimes from the beginning of the 20th century alongside iron plaques made by the American artist David Smith between 1937 and 1940 titled Medals for Dishonour made as an attack on Fascism. The idea of awarding medals for producing children seems perverse. In particular that they tended to be awarded for two very particular reasons; giving birth and managing to keep a number, generally 5 and upwards, alive or, losing your child while they were in a role of service to their country..
They are each based on a pronatalist medal but with a motto from a serving military regiment attached creating an award which is pertinent to a particular situation for women today.

based on; Order of the Mother Heroine - Soviet Union -raising 10 or more children (replaced by the Order of Parental Glory in 2008)
Motto; Germany- Kampfschwimmer/ Verwendungsgruppe 3402 - Subaqua Special Combat Force - Lerne zu Leiden ohne zu Klagen - Learn to suffer without Complaint.

based on; Medal of Motherhood,Albania - bronze awarded for 5 children when youngest is 1year old (awarded 1950’s onwards , replaced in 1970’s by Order of Motherhood Glory).
Motto; Norway - Oppklaringseskadronen - Reconnaissance Squadron - Ser Alt, Alltid - Sees all, Always.

based on; Cross of Honour of the German Mother - Mutterehrenkreuz - Germany raised at least 4 or more children (Awarded between 1939 and 1945)
Motto; Italy - Guardia di Finanza (Financial Guard) Nec Recisa Recedit - Does not retreat even if broken)

based on; Medal of Honour of the Family -Medaille d’honneur de la famille francaise - France ( still awarded)- It is very interesting that it denotes French family) originally awarding only mothers (1920-) included fathers in reform (1983) Bronze for 5+children also for children dying in the service of the country
Motto; America, American Armed Forces 89th Airlift Wing - Experto Crede - Believe one with the experience.

based on; Order of the Mother - Republic of Belarus - Bronze is for 5 plus children also for children killed or missing as a result of efforts to protect the Homeland/ State - (still awarded)
Motto; Netherlands - Koninklijke Luchtmacht - Royal Netherlands Air Force, 334 Squadron - Semper et Ubique - Always and Everywhere.

Quote from The Unwomanly Face of War by Svetlana Alexievich - Penguin Modern Classics; from the chapter “They awarded us little medals...“ An oral history of Russian women who fought in WW2.

embroidery on handmade paper, pigment

based on the polar medal for endurance

Forward Through The Night

Auctioned for SCOOP Foundation to fund a field maternity hospital in Syria

performance/sculpture

things break down

If Mothers

mother others,

who mothers

mothers?

(life in reverse)

performance and sculpture; Rachel Fallon at the invitation of Aine Phillips for Buttered Up at Mart Gallery, Dublin 06/03/2020

I enter the space, hair plaited tightly and bound, carrying a large bag over my shoulder and a bucket full of vinegar.

A chair is set on the diagonal near the wall and I place my bag and bucket near it. From my bag I take an Apron, the altered ego, made from an evening dress, which itself was made and worn by my mother before she married and had children. I put it on.

The apron has a pocket and from the pocket I take a hammer and a nail. I measure the wall as to the approximate height of my mother and whack the nail in.

From my bag I start to pull lengths of wire wool. I smooth them and tease them out and then dip them in the bucket of vinegar, lifting and dipping and squeezing like washing, like milking a cow. I fashion a ball like knot the size of my own head and hang it on the nail, draping another layer of washed wire wool over it. I slowly tease it into strands adding more wire wool and I slowly begin to plait, longer and longer, stopping only to rinse a new length and add it. I plait and plait until I can plait no more, there is nothing left to plait. The wire wool begins to turn slowly from silver grey, my mothers hair colour to reddish brown, mine.

I finish the coil, wipe my stained hands on the apron and begin to unbind my own hair. I undo all the plaits and untangle it until it is a mass of frizz. I nail two nails into the wall at the height of my own shoulders. I take off my apron and hang it on them. I pick up my bag and my bucket and leave.

In the next weeks, the coil of ‘hair’ will slowly disintegrate into small particles of metal rust.

hand cast iron, steel, silk, hand embroidery.

The chain of office or livery collar belongs to a medieval history of swearing oaths and allegiances to people in power who are supposed to act in the interests of the greater good. The badge or device at the centre indicated the person the livery related to. The centre piece here is a combined Order of Parental Glory/ Miraculous Medal design. The order of Parental Glory was established in 2008 (by presidential decree) to reward deserving parents of exceptionally large families. It was based upon the soviet order “Mother Heroine” and belongs in the pronatalist ideology. So on one hand you have governments and ideologies that are all about birth-rate and on the other hand you have a lack of resources and support in particular for poor women who have larger families hence the Miraculous Medal (apparently the Virgin Mary appeared to Saint Catherine Labouré on the eve of feast of St. Vincent de Paul to task her with this mission of making the medal complete with design instructions). The M stands for Mother and her immaculate heart is pierced by a knife in a foretelling of the fate of her child. It also plays to the idea of the deserving and undeserving poor. The rest of the tokens are bread tokens which were used historically in times of austerity and war ie war effort/ food production tokens linking food and war.

Tokens left to right; Bamby bread token, Missouri; Chinese Order of the Golden Grain/Splendid Harvest/Bountiful Harvest - 1912 (awarded for outstanding civil or military achievement in meeting the demands of feeding a vast population in the face of drought and floods) ; Half loaf bread token, Shanghai; War Food donation token, Germany 1914, with the motto Without Bread, No Victory; Bread token, Iceland 1900; Women’s Land Army Badge WW2; China token society bread token, half loaf; War Food Donation badge, Germany, WW2 with motto We Sacrifice for the Daily Bread; Australian Bread token, pioneer bakery, one loaf.

Made with the support of the IRON-R18 research project.

No Labour, No Bread - detail

hand cast iron, steel, silk, embroidery

made with the support of the IRON-R18 research project.

wax, pigment, milk substitute favoured by my son, copper pot bought from a girl who grew up in Berlin where my son was born, feeding chart.

This is a performance piece and comes with feeding chart sandlotter of information regarding loco parentis. The pot must be filled with oat milk every morning and washed and changed as the oat milk sours during the day. In the evening before closing the piece should be washed and dried for the night. All actions should be recorded on the attached feeding chart.

A response to Wasteland - Eva Kot’átkova and Dominik Lang.

https://projectartscentre.ie/event/eva-kotatkova/

A package of earth containing a bulb is ambiguously addressed to a florist whose business has the same name as a local arts centre. On opening the package delivered by the Post man the Florist realises the mistake. She then takes it upon herself to deliver the box of earth to the Arts Centre.

in which a female icon becomes a hollowed out vessel as decreed by a god.

Plaster statue found thrown in a ditch following the death of it’s previous owner; a woman I once knew, drawer retrieved from a skip during the house clearance of the woman who owned the statue, domestic detritus.

or how the contents of a vessel may often have no relation to the appearance of the vessel itself.

Companion piece to The Judgement of Clytemnestra

Plaster hollowed out from the interior of a statue found thrown in a ditch, drawer from a writing desk belonging to the woman from whom I first heard mention of Clytemnestra, candle wax, silk stockings(worn).

as performed for Fluxus - Mixing/Stewing at Signal Arts Centre 7/03/2020

Digital print, embroidery and mixed media on oil cloth and vinyl. A3 size

Commissioned for Spread, touring exhibition for Grrrl Zine Fair U.K.

The oracles speak on inner emptiness and matters of gravity

The Bloody Revolution and what came next

Climate Change and the Politics of Deforestation

The Fashion pages

True Wives Story and the Problem page

A Bleeding Heart

Wipe clean edition complete with marigold gloves, cleaning mat and added household sponge for that extra hygienic sparkle.

The foundation of this work is the fact that the average wage per hour of an early years educator is €11.12. (from ECI findings, Doing the Sums; The Cost of Providing Childcare, September 2016) which is below the Living Wage of €11.90 which is considered the absolute minimum essential standard of living (MESL) as calculated by VPSJ (Vincentian Partnership for Social Justice). The idea of an All you Can Eat Buffet comes from Las Vegas Circe 1946. A buffet was also a display of wealth in 16th c France and it referred to both the food display and to the furniture on which it was mounted which was often draped in rich textiles- Louis the XIV - the Sun King ‘ who was famously attached to his mother Queen Anne (she handed military secrets over to Spain) had St Vincent de Paul as her spiritual advisor (1643) (VdeP died 1660). For them, the plates and silver buffet furniture had to be melted down at the mint to pay for the wars at the end of Louis XIV’s reign.

During the exhibition of this piece at Mermaid Arts Centre, Bray, Irl, an (in)voluntary collaboration occurred. On several occasions visitor(s) to the exhibition found it necessary to take the piece of leatherette which surrounded the piece and use it to cover up the two wax breasts that were purposely being ‘uncovered’. This led to an unwitting participation, on their part, in making exactly the point I had intended, namely the hiding of labour involved in childcare.

- Royal Australian Navy; submarine service motto Wool felt, contact lenses, hair, safety pin, leatherette, 2018

This is really the story of the invisible woman, a counterpart to the H.G.Wells male character who becomes insane as a side effect of his invisibility. She is Metis, wife of Zeus, who challenged her to turn into a fly and then swallowed her (consumed her whole) as he feared she was becoming too strong resulting in the birth of the warrior Athena from her father’s head the existence of her mother being completely erased. She is a Herma, a boundary marker offering protection and fertility.

Installation - at Mermaid Arts Centre, Bray

Royal Australian Navy; submarine service motto Wool felt, contact lenses, hair, safety pin, leatherette, 2018

stained tea towel, spray paint

John Locke (1632 - 1704) referred to it as a fundamental rule for government

I came across this quote while researching army mottos for the Aprons of Power. It appeared in many different forms for differing groups and agendas, used as quotes by Locke and Hobbes but also appearing on an engraving of Cromwell. As a motto for the Aprons of Power it’s diverse associations were too conflicted. I was rather attached to it though as it does seem like a very noble tenet and yet a somewhat abused one. Looking at the whole domestic sphere for this exhibition I got really interested in tea towels, as they are such a commonplace item used for drying and mopping up and for holding things too hot to handle - their origin is in 18th century England as part of the good linen for the tea service. They were also a way of showing needle skills as they were often embroidered. Eventually the embroidery was replaced by the decorative and then the souvenir. It’s such a gendered present, to bring back a tea towel with the sights of some noteworthy historical site to hang on the kitchen wall. This morphed later in the 70’s and 80’s into witty aphorisms and quotes, which in a way correlated, for me, to the quote from Cicero - this noble idea becoming more and more jaded through the centuries - used to sop up and support dodgy ideologies, so to marry both material and idea seemed right. The spray painting of the motto also echoed the punk philosophy of the anti-establishment where no one is interested in drying up anyway and the plasticity of this renders it useless in the same way that the souvenir tea towel was no good for drying.

wool, paper, ribbon.

This body of work was made in an effort to explore the need to protect the unprotect-able. Apprehension has been part of my parenting experience. Small hands have soft, slippery skin that slides easily away. At the beginning of pregnancy the weight of responsibility comes with the realization that protection and security are an illusion and really the only weapons are hope and luck.

wool, paper, ribbon.

bronze amulet

This is an amulet to ward off drowning.

I come from an island country and the ferry is the cheapest way home. I have recurrent dreams. It is chaos and night. The ship is going down and I fear the children being ripped from my hands. I stuff the baby down my clothes, buttoning, zipping, fastening him to me so he will not be lost. The toddler, I tie my arm to his arm, afraid his tiny hand will slip from mine in the melee. The ship falls from under us and we plunge in to the sea.

I will only have two children. We live by the sea. I can only keep two children afloat.

Islanders are superstitious. Children born with a caul are friends of the mermaids. Their caul means they will never drown. My children are not caulbearers so I must make an amulet to evoke its power.

Baby's First Knife

cotton, wool, silk thread.

Service Rattle

cotton, wool, silk thread.

Life size performance hood

Approx 30 cm in height

Sculpture – wool textile, vintage glass dolls eyes

The MotherHood is both unidentifiable super hero who has eyes everywhere and misses nothing but it is also it’s more sinister shadow side of someone imprisoned in their role.

performed for the Repeal the Eighth Amendment Campaign and PIMP Zine

digital print on zoffany wallpaper - 21 x 30cm - unique

“One must be a work of Art or wear a work of Art” - Oscar Wilde– is a photographic print on wallpaper. This work deals with womens’ oft relegation to by-stander roles as mothers unless appearances of youth and sexual attractiveness are kept up. It speaks about becoming framed as ‘Mummy’.

(after mark wallinger)

digital print for Desperate Artwives online performance day

digital print on prescription paper

Plague doctor mask.

in response to massive studio closure and underfunding of the arts sector in Ireland Outpost Studios created a protest performance for Culture Night 2016

Protest Pack includes; How to protest booklet, protest participant checklist, protest prayer and why we protest information flyer.

All In The Mind was part of a body of research that explores women's work and the intangible qualities of creativity. In this piece I examined the motions of sewing and mending with different end outcomes. Over a 24 hour period I altered or mended one garment given to me for this express purpose and upon finishing this work I created, using the same procedures, part of a piece of art work. The concept behind this was an exploration of the relationship between sewing and mending – traditional ways for women to make an income and strive for some kind of financial independence and the work of an artist also searching for ways to support their practice, often through low end jobs. While this is often viewed as a negative struggle I look at the possibility these low end jobs might provide an artistic freedom whereby there is no accountability for what is made no matter how incongruous with the art market or gallery viewpoint and that the transition between a skill technique and art takes place within.

wood, wool, glass, surgical tape, found object.

Black Church Print Studio, The Library Project, Dublin. - 2017

PIMP Zine

...pff
publications are a feminist zine collective (eleanorPhillips, rachelFallon, emmaFinucane) who create work around themes of bodily autonomy,ageing,childbirth/care and other pertinent themes in female realms. They aim to reform social expectations by taking the position of abandonment of the patriarchy while waggishly dissecting serious topics and getting high on printing ink.

http://pffpublications.weebly.com/#

Campaign to Repeal the Eighth Amendment - multiple venues - 2018

Desperate Artwives - FILIA, feminist conference, London, UK - 2017

A4 photocopy, hand embroidery - 2016

A4 photocopy, hand embroidery - 2016

tabletop refuge for overwhelming thoughts

paper, silk thread

tabletop refuge for overwhelming thoughts

detail

digital print collage on hand made paper

cutlery, cutlery drawer, gesso.

cast iron, enamel paint.

Made with the support of the Iron-R2 research project

cast iron, enamel paint.

bone, unfired clay, pigment, cast iron.

cast iron, cotton, silk, leather, paper.

Made with the support of the Iron-R research Project 2012

gesso on board, matchboxes, silk, insects.

typeset drawer, assorted wallpaper with typewritten words

typeset drawer, assorted wallpaper with type written words