Eve­ry year, 73 mil­lion women world­wi­de have an abor­tion. I was one of them in 2023. As I went throu­gh my own abor­tion, the women around me star­ted sha­ring their sto­ries. The­se women were fami­ly mem­bers, friends, acquain­tan­ces, and even stran­gers – women from dif­fe­rent gene­ra­tions and natio­na­li­ties. I lear­ned that my fee­lings of lone­li­ness and sha­me were not uni­que to me, but were tied to a long linea­ge of women who have clai­med the right to auto­no­my over their own bodies and lives.

In this pro­ject, “In the soft­ness of the bel­ly…”, I explo­re the inter­con­nec­ted care net­works among women by mee­ting and con­ver­sing with over twen­ty women who under­went abor­tions, inclu­ding my mother and both my grand­mo­thers. Their sto­ries and per­spec­ti­ves acted as a gui­de for a pho­to­gra­phic dia­ry, explo­ring dif­fe­rent aspec­ts of their expe­rien­ces intert­wi­ned with my own. Throu­gh this inti­ma­te, highly per­so­nal pho­to­gra­phic approach, which is pri­ma­ri­ly ancho­red in the mun­da­ne, I use ana­log snap­sho­ts and por­trai­ts to crea­te a visual repre­sen­ta­tion of what abor­tion can feel and look like.