Throughout the process of giving birth for the first time, artist Emily Larsen began to feel removed from her own base humanity. "Having just gone through arguably one of the processes that we share most closely with our beastly brethren, I felt disjointed between what was happening to my body and what the medical crew was demanding of me." So Larsen, a feminist who tends to focus on the absurd and surreal, turned to dioramas of taxidermied animals at the Natural History Museum to create her series Beastly, which explores her feelings of disconnection with the natural world.
This work was a way for Larsen to deal with her newfound motherhood. Giving birth has never been and never will be an easy task. The reality of constant observation by male doctors, immense pain, and being told what to do as she struggled to control her own body shocked Larsen. Much like the animals on display at the museum, she felt as though she was displayed behind a glass pane when laying on her hospital bed.