ARTIST STATEMENT
The Hysteria Project is a one-on-one storytelling initiative dealing with menstruation, reproductive, and pelvic disorders, illustrated by life-sized individual collages of participants’ reproductive organs based on their stories and supported by an online searchable archive.These life-sized, intimate works are made from cameraless photographs of lace on a metal leaf background. Women and other AFAB people are often seen as the medical ‘other’. When we experience pain or excessive bleeding, it is too often disregarded, and treated as ‘normal’ by the medical field. The way our bodies are handled is a kind of trauma on top of the trauma of the illness itself. Various cultures -including my own- treat our bodies as dirty and shameful. This shame leads to us not speaking out, even to doctors. These issues, plus cultural biases, mean that there is a gap in our cultural awareness about our illnesses, especially when they involve the vulva. The Hysteria Project bears witness to stories of these crucial aspects of our lives, first by offering people an outlet to share their stories, and second, by honoring their bodies. As one storyteller said upon seeing her portrait, “Now I visualize beauty when I think of it, even when in pain.”
ABOUT THE ARTIST
Rachael Jablo is a chronically ill, queer, Jewish, Berlin-based American artist and educator who works with photography, installation, collage and storytelling to discuss issues around illness, the body, and gender. Her work has been seen in a solo exhibition at USC’s Hoyt Gallery, at the Torrance Museum, and at the Museum für Fotographie in Braunschweig and has been featured in Ever-Emerging Magazine, on WNYC’s The Takeaway, and Slate. Her recent work, The Hysteria Project, received a Neustart Kultur Grant for Innovative Arts from the German Government in 2021-2022. She is participating in the EU-wide arts and narrative medicine endometriosis program, Breaking This Silence that will run through 2025, and is the keynote speaker at the Endometriosis (R)Evolution narrative medicine conference at the University of Graz, Austria in May 2024.
© Rachael