What better gift for Mother’s Day than health? Today, May 14, artist Michelle Browder unveils her mobile medical ‘pod’ – a motorhome she bought in April and converted into a traveling health clinic. Alongside a doula, midwife and obstetrician-gynecologist, she plans to hit the road next month with the mobile unit to bring maternal health services to people living in rural areas of the state where there is little or no access.
In the United States, maternal mortality is the highest in decades, and studies show that these numbers are only increasing. These stats also vary by ethnicity and race. For black women, the death rate is exceptionally high — more than double the average rateand nearly three times the rate of their white counterparts, according to 2022 data from the National Center for Health Statistics.
“We hear the stats all the time, and I’m sick of it,” Browder said. Hyperallergic. “We’ve been hearing this for 15 to 20 years, but now it’s getting worse.”
Beginning in mid-June, Browder and her team will leave Montgomery once a month for three days at a time to provide needed services to people at any stage of motherhood and give people “a space where they can be encouraged, uplifted and get checked out,” Browder said.
The artist is perhaps best known for her “Mothers of Gynecology” sculpture, unveiled in 2021 to an outpouring of national attention. Located in Montgomery, Alabama, the work commemorates Anarcha, Lucy and Betsey – three enslaved women who were subjected to barbaric medical experiments at the hands of the so-called “father of gynecologyDr. J. Marion Sims in the early 19th century.
“This monument is more than just a monument. It is a living memorial to the women who have been sterilized and essentially tortured in our country,” Browder explained to Hyperallergic.
Sims has often been considered a pioneer in gynecology for the development of the modern speculum as well as several pioneering medical procedures, but in recent decades he has come under fire for his unethical practices. During his career, he used enslaved women from nearby plantations as test subjects for his medical research, experimenting on them without their consent or the use of anesthesia.
A sculpture made up of three large metal figures adorned with beaded jewelry, medical tools and the names of famous black women, “Mothers of Gynecology” gives faces to women who suffered under Sims’ torture and re-examines history false narratives regarding maternal health care in the United States.
“[The sculpture] gives the rest of the story that we haven’t talked about, in terms of the objectification of black bodies, in terms of the sex trafficking and rape of black women, and then the science that came out of that,” said Browder said.
The work is in Browder’s Upper campus, which includes Mothers of Gynecology Monument Park, a gift shop, and soon to be the Creative Changemakers Museum and the More Up Traveler Center. The museum will be dedicated to exploring the untold stories of Anarcha, Lucy, and Betsey, as well as Montgomery’s role in medical history. In addition, the Traveler Center will provide education and temporary housing for travelers and activists visiting Montgomery. The campus grounds are also home to Browder’s More Than Tours, which teaches visitors about Montgomery’s history of slavery, racism, and the civil rights movement.
Recently, with the help of grants and endowments, Browder was able to acquire the site where Sims originally performed his cruel experiments nearly 200 years ago. As part of the More Up renovation project, the building at 33 South Perry Street will be transformed into the Mothers of Gynecology Health and Wellness Museum and Clinic, providing resources for uninsured women, gynecologists, doctors, doulas and midwives, according to the Plus Website in place.
“Reshaping the narrative on the site where these experiences took place, where these girls were enslaved, trafficked and mutilated, is empowering, not just for me as a black woman, but for those who come behind me. “Browder said.
Browder said she was confident the clinic would be ready by 2024, but explained that “there is an emergency right now” with the current state of maternal health care in the United States. So in the meantime, her mobile health unit will allow her to do the work she hopes to eventually do at the clinic.
“We can’t wait,” she said.
