Jennifer Weigel
I first started making art about menstruation several years ago. It seemed a natural exploration for me, since so much of my work focuses on identity and gender relations & stereotypes. I wanted to create work about menstruation as a means of exploring the taboo subject that is such a big part of women’s lives. I was especially interested in the idea of coming of age and of celebrating womanhood because culturally we don’t value this transformation enough and often associate menstruation with shame, guilt and uncleanliness. Like any taboo subject, there are many myths and untruths associated with menstruation that linger because people don’t discuss the topic enough to dispel them. So, by drawing attention to the subject of menstruation, I hoped to encourage people to talk about it, confront the taboo and demystify a subject that is regarded as shocking but really shouldn’t be, as it is a natural function of the female body.

When I first began exploring menstruation, I applied acrylic paint to a white nightgown in an artwork entitled Coming of Age. This work was never shown and was highly unsuccessful, in part due to my approach and in part because I felt that I was skirting the taboo associated with genuine menstrual blood by using acrylic paint to represent it. I then began exploring the theme in jewelry, creating hand-beaded necklaces that counted through the days of the menstrual cycle so that the wearer could celebrate womanhood and menstruation in an indirect fashion. (I have since made many bracelets in similar fashion to serve the same purpose, ideally meant to be given to young women first starting their cycles as a means of celebration.) My menstruation work later culminated in a series of bodily function monoprints made by pressing my menstrual vagina to watercolor paper to leave a bloody mark, and although I have continued to explore the theme since then I still consider these pieces to be my strongest and most direct pieces on the topic of menstruation.

I first showed the monoprints on the Museum of Menstruation’s website. Their first physical appearance was in a show in upstate New York and later on I showed them again at Venus Envy in St. Louis in 2007. After seeing how my work was received at Venus Envy and the conversations that it spawned, I began to envision a group exhibition exploring the theme of menstruation. I knew that a similar exhibition had been shown at Woman Made Gallery in Chicago over a decade ago, but I hoped to organize such a show in St. Louis. The idea lingered around in my head for awhile before I asked a group of women artists in the St. Louis Chapter of the Women’s Caucus for Art if they thought it was an appropriate subject to breach or if it was better left untouched. (I am not always the best judge of this myself.) The proposed show was received from opposite ends of the spectrum (from those who wanted to make it happen as soon & as big as possible to those who didn’t want to associate themselves with the subject matter at all).

I then better formulated the group show, now entitled Life Blood, and personally invited a large group of women artists whom I admire and whom I thought would approach the subject matter professionally, respectfully and tastefully as opposed to making artwork purely for shock value to promote themselves and their own careers. These artists have since helped me to better realize my vision and have both gotten involved in and inspired me to push the show further than I had originally hoped for. You can see the progression of our efforts here on the Life Blood exhibit website, and can look forward to later viewing our work in a physical exhibition which we are hoping will travel to various locations throughout the city.

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