J. Marion Sims The Father of Gynecology; Exploitation of Self & The Divine Feminine
This piece began with me reflecting on the history surrounding J. Marion Sims and the painful contradiction attached to his legacy.
While he is often recognized as the “father of gynecology,” I became more interested in the human cost behind that title, the exploitation, suffering, and lack of consent experienced by matriarchal indigenous American women whose bodies became sites of experimentation in the name of medical advancement.
As I built the layers of this work, I wanted the composition to feel emotionally exposed and psychologically conflicted. The figures throughout the painting move between vulnerability, sensuality, motherhood, labor, survival, and observation. Some bodies appear empowered, while others feel manipulated or fragmented. That tension became intentional because I wanted the piece to exist between beauty and violation at the same time.
The green atmosphere throughout the composition represents grass, land, and nature itself. To me, it became symbolic of matriarchal land and the relationship between indigenous women and the earth. As I worked through the painting, I began seeing a polarity between the dismantling of land and the violence committed against indigenous women. The idea that both become exploited, consumed, controlled, and stripped away in similar ways. The lower portion of the composition carries a deep brown landscape that reflects soil, dirt, and earth itself. It became symbolic of grounding, ancestry, burial, cultivation, and spiritual connection. The soil almost acts as a foundation beneath the figures, reinforcing the idea that the feminine and the earth mirror one another—both sacred, life-giving, and historically violated through systems of control.
As I layered the collage together, the work stopped becoming only about history and became a reflection of myself as well. It pushed me to seek deeper knowledge of the nature of the matriarch—understanding femininity not only as gender, but as creation, intuition, nurture, spiritual grounding, and connection to life itself. The piece made me reflect on how often humanity disconnects itself from those sacred qualities of the matriarch.
In many ways, the painting became an internal confrontation for me questioning how humanity can simultaneously nurture, exploit, love, and destroy what gives it life. The repeated figures throughout the work create a sense of collective memory, almost as if generations of pain, resilience, nurturing, and survival are overlapping within the same emotional landscape. Some moments feel sorrowful, others intimate, others disturbingly silent. Nothing fully resolves because the emotional weight attached to the history itself still feels unresolved within me.
Through collage and abstraction, I wanted this piece to feel less like documentation and more like psychological residue—the lingering emotional imprint left behind when exploitation becomes normalized through generations.
In that way, J. Marion Sims: Exploitation of Self and the Divine Feminine became not only a reflection of historical trauma, but also a reflection of my own attempt to understand the relationship between land, femininity, humanity, vulnerability, and the sacred nature of the matriarch itself.
While he is often recognized as the “father of gynecology,” I became more interested in the human cost behind that title, the exploitation, suffering, and lack of consent experienced by matriarchal indigenous American women whose bodies became sites of experimentation in the name of medical advancement.
As I built the layers of this work, I wanted the composition to feel emotionally exposed and psychologically conflicted. The figures throughout the painting move between vulnerability, sensuality, motherhood, labor, survival, and observation. Some bodies appear empowered, while others feel manipulated or fragmented. That tension became intentional because I wanted the piece to exist between beauty and violation at the same time.
The green atmosphere throughout the composition represents grass, land, and nature itself. To me, it became symbolic of matriarchal land and the relationship between indigenous women and the earth. As I worked through the painting, I began seeing a polarity between the dismantling of land and the violence committed against indigenous women. The idea that both become exploited, consumed, controlled, and stripped away in similar ways. The lower portion of the composition carries a deep brown landscape that reflects soil, dirt, and earth itself. It became symbolic of grounding, ancestry, burial, cultivation, and spiritual connection. The soil almost acts as a foundation beneath the figures, reinforcing the idea that the feminine and the earth mirror one another—both sacred, life-giving, and historically violated through systems of control.
As I layered the collage together, the work stopped becoming only about history and became a reflection of myself as well. It pushed me to seek deeper knowledge of the nature of the matriarch—understanding femininity not only as gender, but as creation, intuition, nurture, spiritual grounding, and connection to life itself. The piece made me reflect on how often humanity disconnects itself from those sacred qualities of the matriarch.
In many ways, the painting became an internal confrontation for me questioning how humanity can simultaneously nurture, exploit, love, and destroy what gives it life. The repeated figures throughout the work create a sense of collective memory, almost as if generations of pain, resilience, nurturing, and survival are overlapping within the same emotional landscape. Some moments feel sorrowful, others intimate, others disturbingly silent. Nothing fully resolves because the emotional weight attached to the history itself still feels unresolved within me.
Through collage and abstraction, I wanted this piece to feel less like documentation and more like psychological residue—the lingering emotional imprint left behind when exploitation becomes normalized through generations.
In that way, J. Marion Sims: Exploitation of Self and the Divine Feminine became not only a reflection of historical trauma, but also a reflection of my own attempt to understand the relationship between land, femininity, humanity, vulnerability, and the sacred nature of the matriarch itself.