Editorial Note: Domestic Crisis
At first glance, you might be surprised by what’s not in this issue. Absent are some of the usual lodestones of domesticity: overt references to parenting, gender roles, or household labour. Martha Rosler’s Semiotics of the Kitchen makes a brief appearance, but only as a foil. Yet, even without explicit citation, the framing of this issue is undeniably indebted to the feminist and queer canons of art and literature. The classic Second Wave slogan, “the personal is political,” ricochets across many of the texts here. If by now, the phrase feels self-evident (cliché even), its realization remains imperfect. In a digital landscape that incentivizes oversharing, the line between empathy and voyeurism feels increasingly blurred.

Just as the issue was beginning to take shape, Canada, like much of the world, was swept into a fresh wave of protectionism, sparked by threats of U.S. tariffs and spearheading a fever pitch of atypical nationalism. Several of the works in this issue consider how the domestic is shaped not only by private life but also by global currents, family histories, and consumer goods, nudging at the conditions that shape how we live, where we live, and with whom we choose to share our lives.

This issue encompasses diversely articulated negotiations between public and private, examining this dynamic through the lens of the built environment, language, technology, and geopolitics. In my response to Images Festival, I reflect on the programming, which is anchored by politically driven films with a cosmopolitan sensibility. Articles on Ayla Dmyterko, Farihah Aliyah Shah, and Cheyenne Rain LeGrande trace how familial histories are absorbed into their practices, and what it means to reconstitute private material for public consumption. Ella Gonzales and Douglas Watt—artists profiled in this issue—each draw from architectural design, subverting the typical precision of these forms to expose the emotional residue that clings to the built environment. An impulse toward material historicity runs through Darsha Hewitt’s work, transforming discarded home electronics into sonic sculptures, salvaging the detritus of consumer culture with a curious and resourceful sensibility. In a conversation with writer Greg J. Smith, the two discuss the obsolescence and the artist’s penchant for tinkering with “familiar household objects just enough to make people see them differently.”

The issue closes with Holes Holding Whole; Idle Time, a collaborative artists’ project by Ella Dawn McGeough, Erica Stocking, and Amanda Boulos, which has taken on various forms in the past and here is realized in two unique adaptations, both print and online. Part incantation, part meditation, it spirals through image and text to conjure a semi-somatic space where rest is a necessary precondition for creativity, an antidote to the grind of late capitalism, which has cast downtime as a fatal flaw. The web version, supported by EQ Bank, can be explored at anintroverted.net.

The version of domesticity that emerges in this issue meets the moment. Against the backdrop of the ongoing Palestinian genocide, which exposes the fragility of statehood, as the cost of living renders many major cities increasingly unaffordable, and global rifts exacerbate tensions, mobility, and belonging. These crises have given the term “domestic” a rougher edge, compounding the already complex dynamics of the home with escalating stakes. I’m grateful for the contributors who generously and thoughtfully wrestled with all this in real time.

~Madeline Bogoch, Editor BlackFlash 42.2 “Domestic” 

Cover: Erica Stocking, Amanda Boulos and Ella Dawn McGeough, 2025.

BlackFlash is grateful to Canada Council for the Arts and SK Arts for the production and dissemination of this issue.