Data of the Domestic: Series II (Pillowcases)

My first series in Data of the Domestic (on dish towels) lit something up for me and served as the foundation for this second series of work. I'm really enjoying exploring how to make visible the labor and lives of mothers through embroidery (nod to our foremothers) and data from wearable technology. At the spark of this series, I thought about what other data might be readily accessible to me and representative of an aspect of motherhood. What do all moms need more of? SLEEP. Enter Fit Bit sleep data. I reached out to my Facebook community of mostly local moms to see if they'd share screen shots of their sleep cycles with me. Within hours I had over 40 data sets from 14 mothers.

From there I sketch-transferred the sleep cycles onto vintage thrifted pillowcases and embroidered them. Red-blue dotted line for awake, blue solid line for REM and light sleep, and navy-blue dotted line for deep sleep. You'll notice most of these mamas lacking in the deep sleep department.


Each mother's name is embroidered on the back of the pillow case. I have three pillowcases complete so far. My vision is to do one for all 14 mothers who kindly shared their data (and sometimes anecdotal) stories with me. I envision having all 14 hung from an umbrella clothes line dryer as a final installation to have collective impact through individual stories. The goal is to have this installation in the Emergent Media graduate show in May. For now, hanging on a regular clothesline will have to do.

It was heartwarming to read the little notes the women would post along with their data, "this was the night my two year old was up coughing," "wow, no wonder we're all exhausted!". To see the swell of mothers wanting to share was evidence that there is so much we want to talk about... so many stories to tell... so much that is unseen in this role of mother. I'm excited to see where this goes next!

Danielle is a 32 year old mother of a 2 year old son. She was awake for 1 hour 26 minutes that night.

Nicole is a 27 year old mother of a 8.5 month old daughter. She was awake for 1 hour 36 minutes that night.

Angella is a 31 year old mother of a 9.5 month old son. She was awake for 1 hour 41 minutes that night.