the gathering around THE VALUE OF WOMEN'S LABOUR framed mothering as both a creative practice and a guiding philosophy for reimagining the world. it explored the burden of care placed on artist- women/artist-mothers, while simultaneously foregrounding care as an essential force in creative processes

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grace’s keynote provocatively engages with this duality, describing the fluid flows of giving and receiving, filling and emptying, obsession and distance, the unseen and the hyper-visible aspects of navigating both motherhood and painting. as grace portrays the mother as both atlas––carrying the weight of the world on her shoulders––and as a vessel constantly emptied and refilled, she paints caregiving as a sacred and inherently creative act. philiswa’s poetic meditation on ‘home’ and ‘mother’, which she frames respectively as the spiritual fluidity of family connection and a matriarchal creative lineage, become charged with intergenerational narratives, self-assertion, and political resistance. she celebrates women as the keepers of cultural and emotional legacies through their sustained hard work. nina describes how her practice shifted when she embraced the creative potential that mothering brought––the ongoing re-negotiations of sharing her studio space, her use of time, the value of interruption, and the necessity to improvise with available materials. she articulates how motherhood prompted a methodological shift that reimagined creative labour as a giving collaboration shaped by parental responsibilities. princia spotlights mother-daughter resilience in migration, offering an intimate look at shared identity and adaptation in displacement. her work explores the complexities of carrying and creating home across geographies. mary corrigall shifted the lens to the representation of women in artistic discourse, emphasizing the need for creative autonomy and advocating for reclaiming women's stories in art to contrast the historical silencing of the female voice

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collectively, these talks call for a deeper recognition of the often invisible physical and emotional labour of women. they celebrate the gatherings as a ‘sacred space’ where participants honoured each other’s struggles and triumphs, reinforcing the importance of nurturing both creative and caregiving roles

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