by FEATURED ARTIST

April Dauscha

April Dauscha, Custody of the Tongue (binding), still image from video (frame 00:03:22), 2013. Courtesy of the artist.

Custody of the Tongue

April Dauscha | Feb 2025 | Issue 42

April Dauscha, *Tools for Tongue Binding,* binding thread, scissors, wood, velvet & mirror, 6" x 5" x 2", 2013. Courtesy of the artist.

My work is about my body. In my creative practice, I explore themes of death, morality, and the female experience, often informed by the visual culture of Catholicism. My art delves into topics of maternal sacrifice, ancestry, and penance, thus intertwined with those of sexuality and sin. Evocative imagery of mouths open, tongues dripping with saliva, golden breasts, locks of hair, and lace is a visual lexicon that bridges the intimate and the sacred.

As a female, a mother, and a Catholic, I am unable to separate my physical body from my work. Our bodies are vessels in which we experience the pleasures and sorrows of life. By using materials like hair, lace, family heirlooms, and undergarments, I reference the rites of passage in a woman’s life, while also reflecting on my own very personal experiences. Marking the passage of time, these materials are remains of our corporeal existence, prompts to memory, nostalgia, and melancholy — the body as both a site of pleasure and a reminder of our eventual mortality.

April Dauscha, Custody of the Tongue (consumption), still image from video (frame 00:03:41), 2014. Courtesy of the artist.

Through voyeuristic-style videos, photographs, and GIFs, I capture my body and handmade props engaged in performances of often sensual and suggestive rituals, blending sacred and profane, reverence and subversion, sexuality and spirituality. The moving images serve as metaphors for corporeal weight, they are acts of penance, and reminders of the inescapable gravity of death.

April Dauscha, *Tools for Consumption,* wood, velvet, mirror, hair 6" x 5" x 2", 2013. Courtesy of the artist.

Recurring motifs in my work, mouth and tongue, recite prayers, confess sins, and partake in the Eucharist. In the series Custody of the Tongue, intimate videos capture acts of binding, veiling, and consuming, each serving as my confessions, my acts of contrition, my penance, blurring the lines between devotion and indulgence, reminders of the consuming nature of desires. This tension reveals the complexity of love and sexuality through the lens of Catholic identity, where the body is both celebrated and shamed. Numerous theological treaties and mystical experiences (e.g., Bernini’s depiction of St. Theresa) suggest that the Divine Love for us can be compared to the love shared between lovers. My work, finding its own place within this long tradition of thought and art, allows both sexuality and spirituality to coexist.

April Dauscha, *Tools for Tongue Veiling*, handmade lace veil, muslin finger towel, wood, velvet & mirror, 6" x 5" x 2", 2013. Courtesy of the artist.

April Dauscha, Custody of the Tongue (veiling), still image from video (frame 00:02:28), 2013. Courtesy of the artist.

Born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky, April Dauscha received her BFA in fashion design at the International Academy of Design and Technology and her MFA in fiber from Virginia Commonwealth University. April has served on the board of directors for the Surface Design Association (SDA) and is one of the founding members of Tiger Strikes Asteroid Greenville (TSA GVL). She has been represented by Page Bond Gallery in Richmond, Virginia and her work has been featured in Vogue Portugal. She has exhibited her work nationally, at the Fuller Craft Museum, MANA Contemporary, and Tracey Morgan Gallery, and internationally in Berlin, Cape Town, Jerusalem, and Belgrade. She is currently heading the fiber arts program at the Fine Arts Center, a performing and visual arts high school, in Greenville, South Carolina.