farah widmer

Placenta #69

Variable dimensions

2024

The work is an abstract representation of a placenta, this temporary organ responsible for transporting nutrients and waste between mother and child, that functions also as a protective blood barrier. In this dual role, at once connecting and separating, Widmer sees the placenta as a potent symbol of porous boundaries. Her interest in its symbolism deepened after the death of her mother, prompting a reflection on the delicate thresholds between life, loss, and inheritance.

Placenta #69 is glazed with iron, manganese, and copper, then fired in a reduction atmosphere. In this environment, copper carbonate gains electrons, shifting its colour from turquoise to red—an alchemical transformation that mirrors the metamorphosis occurring within the womb.

Situating Placenta #69 within the context of feminist art underscores how Widmer’s exploration of the placenta resonates with broader efforts to reclaim the female body as a site of knowledge, autonomy, and creativity. Feminist artists have long challenged the taboo surrounding reproductive organs and maternal experience, revealing how these intimate processes are culturally dismissed or medicalised in ways that distance women from their own bodies. By abstracting the placenta - an organ that embodies connection, protection, and the labour of sustaining life - Widmer restores its symbolic power, reframing it as a locus of both vulnerability and authority. The work becomes an act of feminist reclamation: it honours generational lineage, foregrounds embodied experience, and asserts that the biological and emotional labour of women is worthy of visibility, complexity, and artistic expression.