Jennifer Long : Member Q&A
‘Elasticity’ 2019. Work-in-process, Caesura series, 2019. Created with the support of Ontario Arts Council.
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: My name is Jennifer Long and I’m an artist, curator, and arts administrator. I live in Toronto, with my husband and our two daughters aged 7 and 10.
My artistic practice is propelled by the limited ways in which the experiences of women are represented within image making. Using photography, I work with constructed narratives that are inspired by the quiet moments in women’s lives where seemingly nothing (and everything) occurs. I am especially interested in the complex emotions that underlie these mundane points in time. Communication, vulnerability and transformation are re-occurring themes in my practice.
Art administration and curation are an important and interwoven part of my practice. Most recently I’ve been curating the instagram account for Feminist Photography Network (FPN). FPN is a grassroots organization, founded by Clare Samuel and myself, that is a nexus for research on the relationship between Feminism and lens-based media.
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: Although it comes with some serious distractions, I enjoy having my studio at home. Before children I had a dedicated room for creation, but as my family grew (and the house didn’t), my studio is now the dining room table. This area is transformed on studio days, becoming an editing and sequencing table, space for sketchbook brainstorming, computer station… Working on one exercise at a time, I tidy up after each task or as my studio time comes to a close.
Maintaining a life/work/art balance has always been a challenge for me, but each month I get better at managing my time and not allow the breakfast dishes/unfolded laundry/ to distract me too much.
‘Popsicle Sticks’, Jennifer Long
Work-in-process, Caesuraseries, 2019. Created with the support of Ontario Arts Council.
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: I find having ‘studio day’ booked into my schedule more overwhelming than exhilarating. I’ve found the best way to navigate this is to break my process down into timed tasks/exercises (1 hr – work in my sketchbook, 30 min – look up calls for work, 1 hr – shoot…).
Over the summer I began An Artist Residency In Motherhood, which I have found immensely helpful in keeping me focused. This open-source, self-directed residency created by Lenka Clayton, has inspired me to make some changes in how I work. For example, I now wake up each weekday at 6:00 am and start my day with 30 min of reading before the house begins to stir. I also set weekly art-related tasks for myself as well as a minimum of 15 hrs of dedicated studio time per week. Then each morning, I review my weekly goals and breakdown how I will spend my studio time that day. I diligently set a timer and ensure that my focus is staying on the task at hand and not being interrupted with household tasks and social media distractions.
As you can imagine, I find deadlines immensely helpful in ensuring I keep my priorities in line. This is one of the reasons that in Summer 2017 Clare Samuel and I piloted FPN’s Online Residency. This nine-month online project brought together twelve artists with connections to Toronto or WildFires, Women Photographers Network of Scotland to support one-another with creative work, resources and community building. We focused on midcareer artists because this demographic faces challenges such as balancing parenthood / family and career, isolation from other makers and encroaching health issues. Along with the continual underrepresentation of women in art these factors make it particularly challenging for female artists to keep on creating. We constructed a forum providing deadlines, peer encouragement and visual resources for artists, to help prioritize their practice at least once each month.
Jennifer Long, Untitled, Imminent series, 2012. Created with the support of Ontario Arts Council.
Q: Have you come up against specific challenges as an artist and mother? What were they and how have you navigated these challenges?
Prior to having children, I worked with a large format camera and strobe lighting, primarily using my home as the backdrop to my images. After my first daughter was born, I found my past process was unfeasible given the new responsibilities motherhood brought. After the fog of family life started to lift, I realized that if I wanted to continue to make art, I needed to loosen up my process. Time became more precious and the steps involved in using analogue (buying film, processing it, making contact sheets…) was prohibitive to my creativity. Eventually, I realized that working digitally offered me the freedom I needed at this point in my life. With this awareness, I started looking at other ways I could enable production to flow more easily. This was how the Imminent (2012-date) series started.
Imminent began as a series of self-portraits that visually articulated my reflections of being pregnant. I wanted to voice my experience of the complicated transformation into motherhood and articulate the new and changing relationships I was experiencing with my community and home. When I expanded the series to include other pregnant women, I laid down guidelines regarding locations and lighting to reduce my barriers. I would travel to my subject’s house on public transport and give myself time to focus before the session. I wanted to interact with and respond to the women and the space during our time together and not preplan how the women would be posed or what they would wear. Removing the preplanning, using natural light, and moving to digital helped me start shooting again.
‘RielyndPaige’, Jennifer Long
Work-in-process, Caesuraseries, 2019. Created with the support of Ontario Arts Council.
Q: Who are your role models? Who or what inspires and encourages you?
A: I am very lucky to be surrounded by a close-knit arts community who celebrate one another’s successes and are always available during times of struggle. Although there are so many people I could mention, two senior artists who have been particularly supportive are Barbara Astmanand April Hickox.Both of these women have generously shared with me their experiences as artists, educators, and mothers and have been inspirational figures in my life. Their dedication to their studio practice is unrivalled by anyone I’ve ever met.
I love seeing how other artists approach documenting women’s experiences. A few pieces which have resonated with me recently are Midlife by Elinor Carucci, Joannie Lafrenière’s short documentary Snowbirds, Kelly O’Brien’s presentation of Postings from Home and Arpita Shah’sNalini. In addition I find writers such as Alice Munro and Roxane Gay amazing resources of inspiration.
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: My artwork has always interwoven my personal experiences, therefore, I never questioned that motherhood would become a theme within my practice. What I didn’t realize was how complicated that would be. I’m attempting to visualize something that I can barely put into words, an experience that is laden with cultural expectations, competing emotions and ethics to navigate. It’s filled with wonder and sweetness and ambivalence and dread.
I’m currently working on a body of work, Caesura (a Latin word to describe a pause or break within a specific poetic verse) that examines the dichotomy between mirroring and the assertion of self that I witness between my daughters and myself. As my children move through girlhood, I see their social development evolve through their interactions with one another, peers and adults. I am intrigued by the subtle details in these casual exchanges: the awkward pauses, the self-conscious yet self-aware body language, and an indifference to personal space. Inspired by observations of childhood growth, Caesura creates dialog on topics of autonomy, intergenerational experience and intimacy.
Jennifer Long, Caesura series, 2019.
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: As a mother and a woman, I aim to teach them to question the world and to question others biases as well as their own. I want them to know that althoughsociety has particular ideas of what is valuable, they need to decide for themselves what is important. I want to teach them that they are capable of making change and that change can be made with small actions.
Q: What drives you to continue to create work?
A: Late-day sun, stern glances, and still hands.