Femme Maison 2005

Louise Bourgeois stitched this soft sculpture, Femme Maison, at some point in her long career. It’s this reclining, almost pillow-like form of a woman, and on her back sits a small, boxy house. I feel for Louise making this. It’s like she’s pulling this image out of her own body. The figure is so muted, raw, and kind of vulnerable. Like, here's this soft body made of stitched fabric, maybe remnants from home, or a memory of a material. It’s so corporeal. And then, bam, there’s this house stuck right on the woman’s back. What does that even mean? What’s she saying about women, about home, about bodies? I love how Louise embraced ambiguity and uncertainty. It's like, the conversation is always moving. We keep reinterpreting, keep pushing, keep seeing new things. Artists are constantly in dialogue, inspiring each other across time. It’s about embodied expression and resisting fixed meanings.