Marjolaine Gallet (Into the Fold, 2022)

Into the Fold: Artist / Mother Identity

A Nine Month Creative Practice for Artist Mothers

May 2026 - February 2027

What is it? 

This nine-month cohort creates space for artists to challenge conventions around caregiving and parenting through their creative practice. Through structured sessions, peer dialogue, generative prompts, critical feedback, and an (optional) online shared “studio” space we'll develop work that reflects our lived experiences while engaging with broader conversations about care, labor, identity, and art-making.

Who This Is For

Artists working across all disciplines who are exploring themes of caregiving, parenting, and care work in their practice. Whether you're deep in a specific project or seeking community and structure to begin, you're welcome here. This is a space to create, transform, share work-in-progress, and receive thoughtful, specific critique. For some, this will be a place of deep exploration into new ways of working; for others, a space to polish, edit, and complete an existing project. This intimate cohort is limited to 12 participants to ensure meaningful dialogue and individualized attention. We define 'mother' not by biology or birth, but by the act of claiming that role — an identity shaped by care, labor, and lived experience, open to all who hold it. If you call yourself a mother, you belong here.

What You Might Create

A nine-month format supports completion of substantial projects such as:

• Develop new work, deepen work in progress, or finally bring a long-held idea to life in a form that holds it — examples include an artist book, catalog, or zine.

• Excavate and activate archival material and older projects that have been waiting for the right moment, context, or push.

• Leave with a polished portfolio and refined artist and project statements — work that is ready to be seen and positioned for what comes next.

• Build a cohesive body of work primed for exhibition submissions, grant applications, residency proposals, and publishing opportunities.

  Not every artist arrives with a defined endpoint, and that's not a limitation. It's a way of working. Many participants come seeking sustained critical dialogue and community support for the ongoing work of sequencing, editing, curating, and material exploration. These are not peripheral concerns; they are central to an evolving practice. Work in progress is the reality for most of us, and entering this space with the intention to simply make, to show up and do the work, is not only welcome here. It's valued.

Format & Structure 

Participants will have an opportunity to connect in several ways. 

1. Monthly Lecture & Dialogue: Join Lesly Deschler Canossi for live, one-hour monthly online sessions of her course Into the Fold: Artist / Mother Identity exploring the visual and theoretical landscape of care work in art. Pioneering figures like Mary Kelly, Betye Saar, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Senga Nengudi, Catherine Opie, Renee Cox established critical frameworks that contemporary artists such as Ani Lui, and Carmen Winant continue to build upon. Today, maternal art studies, feminist mothering scholarship, and international artist-parent networks offer robust tools for creative inquiry into care work. Yet despite COVID-era conversations about "essential work," caregiving remains undervalued and underrepresented in art, culture, and advocacy. Through close examination of historical pioneers and contemporary practitioners, these live lectures (and conversations) will help you situate your creative practice within broader conversations about caregiving, labor, identity, and representation. Sessions take place live on the 2nd Monday evening (EST) of each month and remain available for viewing for 30 days afterward, allowing you to engage on your own schedule.

2. Primary Critique Sessions: Meet monthly live online for 2.5 hours with Lesly and Artist-in-Residence Alexa Mazzarello in a supportive studio environment designed for creative risk-taking and substantial feedback. Whether you're experimenting with entirely new approaches or refining work toward completion, these sessions offer dedicated time to share in-progress work and receive thoughtful, specific responses. A flexible sign-up system accommodates both extended critiques and shorter check-ins, ensuring everyone gets the feedback they need at each stage of their process. In month seven, we'll welcome a guest artist or curator. Past guests have included Toni Pepe and Dyana Gravina. Space is limited to 12 seats.

3. Private Online Studio Space: Between sessions, you'll have access to a private 24/7 online platform managed by Lesly, not by social media algorithms or tech corporations. This is your space to share work-in- progress, ask for quick feedback, post relevant articles, circulate open calls, screen related content, or connect in whatever ways serve your practice. The sky's the limit: use it daily, pop in occasionally, or simply lurk and absorb. There's no pressure to perform or maintain a presence. This is a tool that adapts to how you work best. Think of it as an extension of our studio sessions: a place where the conversation continues, resources flow freely, and the community builds organically around what matters to all of us.

4. Ongoing Community Networking & Building: Beyond our formal sessions, you're invited into a wider creative network. Throughout the year, Lesly and Alexa will extend invitations to gatherings and events—including opportunities to meet in person in NYC, online artist talks, exhibitions, and anything good we're up to! Consider this an open door to expand connections, share resources, and support one another's practices well beyond our nine months together.

5. Two one-on-one private sessions with Lesly (scheduled flexibly throughout the program). This optional add on is ideal for artists working toward specific goals who want personalized guidance alongside community support. Choose this if you're preparing for an exhibition, residency, grant application, or major project milestone and would benefit from tailored one-on-one attention at key moments.

Session Dates

May 2026 - January 2027 (no sessions August 2026)

Lecture sessions, 1 hour, 2nd Monday of each month (these will be recorded): 5/11, 6/15, 7/13, 9/14, *10/19, 11/9, 12/14, 1/11 & 2/8

Critique sessions, 2.5 hours, 3rd Wednesday of each month: 5/20, 6/24, 7/22, 9/23, *10/28, 11/18, 12/23, 1/20 & 2/17

Shweta Bist, (Into the Fold, 2023)

Investment

Testimonials

"What struck me most was how seriously care work was treated - as political, as aesthetic, as worthy of the same critical attention as any other subject. This wasn’t just a course, it's a real program for serious artists who happen to be navigating caregiving, and that distinction matters enormously."  — Ana, Into the Fold, 2023

“I only wish it was longer! It gave me time to actually develop ideas rather than just respond to ideas. By the end, I had a cohesive body of work I'm actively showing, and a community of artists I expect to be in dialogue with for the rest of my career." — Andie, Into the Fold, 2020

"Into the Fold gave me the critical framework I didn't know I was missing. For years I'd been making work about caregiving but struggled to articulate why it mattered. This experience helped me build a visual and theoretical vocabulary that transformed both my practice and my confidence as an artist." — Susan, Into the Fold, 2023

“I found my people.”— Mariana, Into the Fold, 2023

Emily Zarse

How To Join

Into the Fold is a nine-month program for artists ready to develop serious, sustained work at the intersection of caregiving, identity, and creative practice. To ensure a cohesive and supportive cohort, we ask all interested participants to submit a brief interest inquiry before joining.

Deadline to apply May 1st APPLY HERE

• Link to your work online (website, social media, blog, etc.), or 3–5 images of your work (any medium, any stage). Work-in-progress is welcome.

• A short written response (250–300 words) about what draws you to this program and what you hope to explore or create over these nine months.

• Your basic contact information, plus any additional materials you'd like to share (optional). There are no wrong answers here — we're looking for curiosity, commitment, and a genuine investment in your practice.

Applications are reviewed on a rolling basis until filled. You'll hear back within three days of submission.

Please note: the Full Program (tier 2) is limited to 12 seats.

We would love to hear from you. If you'd like to set up a call to discuss whether this is the right fit for you, please reach out—we are happy to connect and answer any questions you may have.

Cappy Hotchkiss, Into the Fold 2022

Sylvie Redmond, Into the Fold, 2022

Alexa Mazzarello

Lesly Deschler Canossi,

Into the Fold creator & lead facilitator, Lesly Deschler Canossi has been engaged with mother-artist work since 2010, when becoming a parent fundamentally shifted her creative practice. What began as a personal reckoning on how to maintain artistic autonomy while navigating partnership, motherhood, and professional demands evolved into a sustained research practice, educational commitment, and community-building effort. In 2012 she began her ongoing project Domestic Negotiations which spanned the first ten years of her experiences as a parent artist. 

In 2016, she developed Into the Fold and taught the first course on artist-parent identity at a major photographic institution, recognizing that despite rich historical precedents, artists exploring care work still lacked dedicated spaces for critical dialogue and development. That same year, she co-founded Women Picturing Revolution to center women photographers documenting conflicts in both public and private realms. Her work has included presentations at the Tate Modern and the publication of Black Matrilineage, Photography, and Representation: Another Way of Knowing (Leuven University Press, 2022).

For over a decade, she has worked at the intersection of artistic practice, technical expertise, and cultural production. As a fine art printer serving institutions like MoMA, SFMOMA, and the Schomburg Center, she has supported artists in realizing their visions at the highest level. As an educator at the International Center of Photography and through independent programming, she has created frameworks for artists to examine caregiving, labor, identity, and representation through their creative work.

Pioneering figures like Mary Kelly,Betye Saar, Mierle Laderman Ukeles, Senga Nengudi, Catherine Opie, and Renee Cox established critical frameworks that contemporary artists such as Ani Lui, Corinne Botz and Carmen Winant continue to build upon. Today, maternal art studies, books, podcasts, feminist mothering scholarship, and international artist-parent networks offer robust tools for creative inquiry into care work. Yet despite COVID-era conversations about "essential work," caregiving remains undervalued and underrepresented in art, culture, and advocacy.

Into the Fold brings together everything Lesly has learned as an artist, educator, researcher, and cultural producer. This nine-month program creates the structured, supportive space she wished existed when she began this work—a place where artists can contextualize their creative investigations, build visual and theoretical vocabularies around care, and develop substantial bodies of work that challenge prevailing norms. The program explores questions of visibility and invisibility, the domestic as site of artistic production, the body in transformation, intergenerational care, and the political dimensions of nurturing work.

Artist in Residence, Alexa Mazzarello is a Canadian lens-based artist and photographer specializing in portrait, documentary, and fine art photography. Since becoming a mother in 2021, her fine art practice has focused on matrescence—the profound transformation of becoming a mother. Her current body of work, Failure to Progress, is an intimate exploration of her birth experiences, combining found photographs, self-portraits, and textiles. With this body of work Alexa was the 2025 winner of PROJECT XO, a combined award through the School of Photographic Arts and the Ottawa Art Gallery. In the fall of 2025, Alexa had a solo show titled Failure to Progress at the Ottawa Art Gallery. Alexa’s work has exhibited in Canada and the UK. She is an active member of Women Photograph and the 44.4 Mother/Artist Collective.

Alongside her artistic work, Alexa maintains a commercial and editorial photography practice. She is a regular contributor to The Globe and Mail and Maclean’s Magazine, and has had commissioned work published Canadian Business Magazine, SERVIETTE Magazine, GRAY Magazine, and Montecristo Magazine, among many others. Alexa lives in Ottawa, Canada with her two children, husband, and dog.

Alexa Mazzarello

Alexa Mazzarello

Alexa Mazzarello