Partus gyno Bitch Tits

The video work PARTUS GYNO BITCH TITS looks at notions of queer nursing in unexpected ways and addresses gendered disparities of reproductive labor. Partus Gyno Bitch Tits evolves around chestfeeding,  biohacking, molecular feminism, induced lactation and male lactation. Partus Gyno Bitch Tits elaborates on nursing practices that exceed gendered categories, while focusing on collective nursing practices and imaginaries of gender equality that support the physical, emotional, mental and economic well-being of caregivers. Nursing does not solidify a gender.


 

Health Investment

The video  work examines the emptied architecture of Semmelweis Clinic, one of the first clinics dedicated to women’s health solely. The pavilions were constructed from 1908 till 1910, as a state orphanage of lower Austria, where in 1909 the first existing human milk bank, preserving breast milk for infants in need, was established. Ignaz Semmelweis opened a clinic for women’s health in these buildings in 1943 which operated for 76 years as an influential health center for women. For centuries women, mothers, daughters and granddaughters gave labor in this public clinic, which is surrounded by a park, equipped with balconies and located in Vienna’s most wealthy residential area. In the last decade, the city started to sell the monument-protected buildings to private investors and the site of the clinic became an object of speculation at the expense of women’s health commodification.

CLAUDIA LOMOSCHITZ

Claudia Lomoschitz works as visual artist, performer and lecturer at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna where she researches on her a PhD regarding cultural implications of lactation and Queer Nursing, supervised by Univ.-Prof. Mag. PhD Elke Krasny. She completed the MA Performance Studies at the University of Hamburg and furthermore studied at the Academy of fine Arts Vienna and Royal Danish Academy of Copenhagen. Her artistic works have been shown among others at Kunstraum Niederösterreich (PARTUS Gyno Bitch Tits, 2021), Tanzquartier Vienna (G.E.L., 2021), brut Vienna (Soft Skills, 2020) and Kampnagel Hamburg (Induzierte Laktation, 2017). Currently she works on care infrastructures within the video project Health Investment examining the former women’s health hospital Semmelweis Clinic in Vienna, raising questions regarding women’s health commodification.