Studio 203 is thrilled to announce Matrilineage: The Knowledge We Carry, a group exhibition featuring eight Los Angeles-based artists. This exhibition celebrates the lineage mothers pass down to their children, illustrating cultural healing methods and hereditary resilience through various craft-based practices. Featuring eight artist mothers, the works on view will reference their experiences as parents and demonstrate the ideals they hope to instill in their children. Participating artists include: Emilyn Eto, Natalie M. Godinez, Lydia Tjioe Hall, Ahree Lee, Elana Mann, Alyson Toone, Patricia Yossen and Aneesa Shami Zizzo.

Mothering, often synonymous with caregiving for children, fundamentally includes caring for ourselves and our communities as well. As antiquated systems continue to unravel, we must reimagine our communities and relationships. By looking at the foundational relationship of mother and child, or primary caregiver and child, we find the crux of emotional connection, which consequently affects how each of us interact with the world. Traditionally tasked with culture-bearing duties, maternal figures share familial traditions and transmit cultural values to the next generation. Matrilineage explores the intentional use of creative practice to care for ourselves and our children, and in turn nourish our communities. Through weaving, quilting, basketry, printmaking, ceramics, jewelry and metal work, each artist reclaims their identity in motherhood in order to create a hopeful future for their children.

Each artist embraces the idea of legacy, engaging their craft discipline to liberate, heal and protect their families. Elana Mann is launching a series of silver necklaces modeled with a 1:1 scale ratio of her 3-year-old’s uterus, conceived as a means to fight the Dobbs decision. Patricia Yossen presents a series of abstract clay figurines created in collaboration with her family to work through a shared trauma. Alyson Toone’s Afro-futuristic ragdoll reclaims her grandmother’s work sewing Shirley Temple dolls to support her family as a single mother. Lydia Tjioe Hall’s works explore the intimate relationship between mother and child. Aneesa Shami Zizzo’s tapestry illustrates a personalized bedtime story for her son containing life lessons she wishes to impart. Emilyn Eto’s “Thrown: Quilted Chair,” memorializes the slow Friday evenings her neighborhood spent together during the early days of COVID. Natalie M. Godinez presents a series of prints illustrating medicinal plants, honoring healing techniques passed down through her own matrilineage. Ahree Lee’s “Timesheet: November 4–10, 2018,” depicts her daily activities in an effort to visualize the invisible and undervalued domestic labor by transforming it into an artwork with monetary and cultural value.

By engaging craft disciplines to address aspects of motherhood, each artist brings relatively invisible perspectives to light. Matrilineage challenges the idea of a patriarchal-influenced society and offers a hope-filled and empowering alternative.