Mater Semper (Certa) Est is an ongoing project.
A mixed media exploration through 15 photographs and one film installation (8 min 53 sec.)
Over the last 40 years, science has progressively conquered the realm of reproduction. In an increasingly de-materialised world, I question the close relationship between human beings and science and the mark of these new technologies on women’s minds and bodies.
My approach is to explore the female body, the only body to materialise life on earth. In this quest for a child, I wonder about our belonging. What about the moon? Our cycles? Our female subconscious?
Mater Semper (Certa) Est is an irrefutable principle of Roman law: The identity of the mother is always certain, unlike the father. Since 1978, when the first child was conceived by the technique of in vitro fertilization (outside of the maternal body), the principle of Mater semper certa is no longer applied.
My intention is not to pass judgment nor to oppose two myths: the scientific territory and the feminine territory, but to raise ethical issues, human responsibility or how the scientist protocol acts and governs procreation.
I am interested in this extremely strict scientific process that fix, destroy or create life. I am trying to understand how this scientific willingness acts on the body and its life experience. I am also wondering about what the female body contains, how this body uses luck, the psychic and magic.
Over the past few months, I have been able to meet several people who enlightened me with their different views and practices: Some thirty women (some of them are part of the movie) having turned to science with a view to procreating or to altering their reproductive system or on the contrary to stop any scientific intervention. An obstetrician gynecologist, a philosopher, a psychoanalyst as well as a Professor who creates transferable embryos every day, have accompanied me.
