Stunning Birth Video (RI doula reflecting on birth)

As an avid observer of all things birth, I often troll YouTube and find births that people choose to share that speak about how transcendent birth can be. This video took my breath away!

How amazing the is birthing body?! It makes me recall a favorite Walt Whitman poem (only excerpts below). He sings the praise of her form so beautifully.

"I sing the body electric...


This is the female form,
A divine nimbus exhales from it from head to foot...



This the nucleus--after the child is born of woman, man is born of woman,
This the bath of birth, this the merge of small and large, and the
outlet again.

Be not ashamed women, your privilege encloses the rest, and is the
exit of the rest,
You are the gates of the body, and you are the gates of the soul.

The female contains all qualities and tempers them,
She is in her place and moves with perfect balance,
She is all things duly veil'd, she is both passive and active,
She is to conceive daughters as well as sons, and sons as well as daughters.

As I see my soul reflected in Nature,
As I see through a mist, One with inexpressible completeness,
sanity, beauty,
See the bent head and arms folded over the breast, the Female I see...

The lung-sponges, the stomach-sac, the bowels sweet and clean,

The brain in its folds inside the skull-frame,

Sympathies, heart-valves, palate-valves, sexuality, maternity,

Womanhood, and all that is a woman, and the man that comes from woman,

The womb, the teats, nipples, breast-milk, tears, laughter, weeping, love-looks, love-perturbations and risings,

The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shouting aloud,

Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking, swimming,

Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-curving and tightening,

The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and around the eyes,

The skin, the sunburnt shade, freckles, hair,

The curious sympathy one feels when feeling with the hand the naked meat of the body,

The circling rivers the breath, and breathing it in and out,

The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward toward the knees,

The thin red jellies within you or within me, the bones and the marrow in the bones,

The exquisite realization of health;

O I say these are not the parts and poems of the body only, but of the soul,

O I say now these are the soul!"

Birthday Fun (RI birth and family photography)

One of the greatest joys of being a doula and family photographer is that it gives me the opportunity to see the families I have served grow! There is something stunning about watching a child be birthed into the world, witnessing their first breath and then seeing them at the time of their first birthday- stepping out (often literally) into the world, personality blooming.

 

Often, this results in a set of images, my gift to the family. I make pictures, I bear witness to the great work of love that is parenthood.  I see the love of the family grow with the child. Sleepless nights written into parents... wisdom, sometimes new laugh lines- a metamorphosis of parent and child.

Aaron Siskind says, “Photography is a way of feeling, of touching, of loving. What you have caught on film is captured forever... it remembers little things, long after you have forgotten everything.”

These are the small details of what we love, our child's hands, the size of their feet, the texture of their baby cheeks. The images take us back when are children are grown, to times when we knew each mark on their bodies. When we were their simple source of joy and comfort.

RI Newborn Photography, RI Family Photography

I had the pleasure of meeting beautiful baby S and spending some time with her wonderful family! I so enjoy hearing the amazing stories about how families welcome their babies...

I love the small details of the newborn. They are universally intoxicating... I must say,  nature designed the system perfectly.

Deepak Chopra says, "It is the nature of babies to be in bliss." This baby certainly proved that statement!

She slept soundly as she modeled a hat I crocheted this week, and showed some real style...

Rhode Island Maternity Photography

It's been a busy few weeks for Agroterra Birth! I was lucky enough over the past month, to photograph two births, a blessingway, and beautiful expectant family. I also attended the first birthdays of two beautiful babies born to previous doula clients. Every day I feel blessed to make the work that I do.

I am always amazed by the brilliance, courage and adventurousness of women as they accept the challenges of pregnancy and birth. This applies also to their willingness for a romp in the snowy woods with me!

I feel so grateful to all the families who have included me in their journeys- to you all out there, you know who you are... I send love and thanks for the start of the most amazing year yet!


www.agroterrabirth.com

The birth project chronicle year one (Gentle Birth RI, Birth Photography RI)

     I photographed my first birth in the year 2003. To say it was a pivotal moment in my work is an understatement. It began as a documentary project about the P family and the year prior to the birth of their second child. A project about birth is a challenge for so many reasons- but primarily because like all things, birth does not happen in a vacuum. This is true about the way we give birth, but is also true with regard to creating work about it. Fortunately, I recognized this truth and began to spend time with the P family—to cultivate the trust and familiarity that would allow them the courage to call me to photograph the birth.

     I say this with the knowledge that being photographed is not the most comfortable experience for many people. This applies to many of us who, even in grade school, dreaded being faced with our own forced smile through the cellophane of our school photo packages. As a professional documentary/portrait photographer and artist, I live in the sometimes gray area, where capturing honest images of my subjects while creating a flattering likenesses can be an interesting and challenging feat. I have always hoped to create images that transcend the common dissatisfaction we can all feel with our photographic image by keeping intact that unique beauty a resonance of a singular moment.


      The P family was incredibly accepting as I chronicled their simple activities- bathing their toddler, a grocery market trip, eating lunch. I think it would be ignorant to suggest that I could be a completely passive element in these activities. Most of the time I spent not documenting, but being. I settled into  'being in their spaces,' fighting the possibility that I might become a force of self-consciousness.


  The birth represented the ultimate challenge technically, emotionally and with respect to my subjects. This first birth I shot humbly with a manual 35mm and no flash whatsoever. This made it easier to be unobtrusive, except for the occasional click, click of my tool. And, of course, there was my actual presence. Luckily the birth happened during the day with some ambient light and so circumstance allowed me to make images that illustrated the quiet dim of the birthing room and the unfolding beauty of that child's first moments of life.

    Mrs. P birthed her second son at the Alternative Birthing Center at Women and Infants Hospital. The space lent its self well to birth, with the functionality of the hospital but the comfort of a home-like space. This birth, its intimacy, power and tenderness, set the scene not only for the photographs I took that day, but also formed the foundation for a belief system about birth that has become part of my professional life, artistic process, as well as personal and health decisions.

Birth Photography RI

Agroterra birth has been working diligently to finish our website- a monumental task of sorts between mothering, attending births and working with Jen on the Home Birth Collective Project and the RI Birth Network. I have so enjoyed meeting and working with the amazing families and professionals in RI and MA this past year! If you have stumbled upon this blog and are interested in following it, please do so- I am hoping to share my journey as a doula and birth photographer with the community. In addition to the work that I do for individual clients, I am also making a body of anthropological/ fine art work about birth, American family culture, and maternal/ neonatal health. If you are interested in the project- stayed tuned as this blog outlines and acts as a journal of the body of work.

And please visit the site!  www.agroterrabirth.com

Baby Photo Session

Thanks to A and baby D for the wonderful photo shoot. I so enjoy working with new families and creating photography that captures the beauty, tenderness, and joy of those early months of life!