Picture at an Exhibition (2022)

A white void; gloved hands reach out and pull. A woman's face clenched with pain. No dialogue save for screams and panting. The gloved hands pull a painting out of Natasha. Her pain subsides, and she cradles the painting in her arms. In the hospital, there are hundreds of other paintings, CDs, novels, and other works of art who were born. They cry out for their loving parents. At home, Natasha hangs the painting up to admire her hard work. She mothers the painting, reading it stories and feeding it. She takes it to the art museum so it can play with the other paintings and win an art contest. She soon realizes no one else sees the beauty in her child, especially not Fabian, the father of the winning art piece. Her painting gets last place. Her friends in the parent support group passive-aggressively mock her painting. Fed up, she runs into the street, only to have her precious baby run over by a car. After the painting is destroyed, she realizes how much she truly loved it. Natasha mourns her dead painting at the cemetery when a stranger named Louise catches her eye. Their shared mourning is magnetic as he too has lost a piece of art. They combine inspirations on top of a gravestone, resulting in a pregnancy. Back at the hospital, Natasha gives birth once more. Only this time the painting is a blank canvas. Louise doesn't react well to this, and no one is sure what Natasha will do next. Natasha locks herself in her room and begins to draw her own painting. She reveals to the entire world that she has painted a new beloved child. No one can tell her it isn't a beautiful work of art.