Portrait of the Artist's Mother: Dignity, Creativity and Disability [Paperback]

Portrait of the Artist’s Motheris a memoir and an examination of the politics of disability. The author describes the pressure from medical institutions to undergo screening during pregnancy and assumptions that a child with Trisomy 21 should not live, even though people with Down syndrome do live rich lives. Years later, Fiona’s son, Fraser, has become an artist. His prize-winning paintings have been exhibited in galleries in Sydney and Canberra.

How does a mother get from the grieving silence of the birthing room through the horrified comments of other mothers to the applause at gallery openings? This is a story of commitment to the idea that all people, including those who are ‘less than perfect,’ have a right to be welcomed into this increasingly imperfect world.

"Fiona Place is one of our great truth-tellers. There is no other writer like her." —Amanda Lohrey, award-winning fiction writer

"This is a wide-ranging, deeply personal examination of the writer’s approach to parenting a son with Down syndrome. There is no sugar-coating, no ‘angels’ or ‘forever children’, but the very real life, great love and perceptive thinking of one mother, one son, one family, forging a good life in twenty first century Australia." —Jill O’Connor, disability advocate

"A powerful must-read book with three strands. Fiona shares her own life as she explores the impact of childhood family relationships on later motherhood, the rights and abilities of individuals with Down syndrome and questions the ethics of current termination programmes. I hope this book provokes widespread debate of these issues." —Sue Buckley OBE, psychologist, Down Syndrome Education International

"Portrait of the Artist’s Motherilluminates all that is wrong with a society that expects children and mothers to be ‘perfect&l³R