Elisabeth Belliveau launches BIRTH STORY
Join us on Tuesday, March 24, 2026 at 7pm for the launch of Elisabeth Belliveau's graphic memoir Birth Story (Conundrum Press)! Elisabeth will be joined by Michelle Campos Castillo and Abby Lacelle to discuss the book and its themes. Books will be available for sale and signing will follow the event. Coffee, wine and beer also available to purchase at Paper Birch Books' in-house bar. Doors at 6.30. Come early to order a drink and hang out!
Birth Story is a graphic memoir about navigating pregnancy, birth, postpartum depression, and new motherhood as an artist. It explores the physical and psychologically altering of the birth process: pain, transformation, trauma, healing, and the window of time around the birthing body. Struggling to find representations of birth and postpartum depression in popular culture and art, the artist interweaves other's stories, friendship, and travel to help make sense of it all. This personal birth story, told through text and drawing, is an effort to remember and contribute to sharing strength in all women's voices and the act of living itself.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR & ARTIST: Elisabeth Belliveau (she/her) is a visual artist and author, a descendant of Acadian, Scottish and Irish settlers. Originally from Antigonish, NS. Belliveau holds a BFA from AU Arts and an MFA from Concordia University. Her studio is currently based in Treaty Six, Amiskwacîwâskahikan, Edmonton AB, where she is an Associate Professor of Studio Arts at MacEwan University. Birth Story is her fifth graphic novel. Alongside zine and book work, Belliveau's art practice engages moving image and sculpture through stop-motion animation, lenticular prints, film, and mobiles. Dedicated to sharing women's stories, she employs diaristic and narrative approaches linking the personal and political. Belliveau has attended art residencies across Turtle Island, including Struts, KIAC, WSW NY, NFB/ONF, Banff Centre for the Arts, and abroad in Belgium and Japan. https://www.elisabeth-belliveau.com/
Michelle Campos Castillo (she/her) is a local Salvadoran artist, designer, and arts administrator. Her most recent exhibits are a solo show, Terremoto, presented in the summer of 2022 at grunt gallery in Vancouver, BC and as part of Imborrable at the National Gallery in San Salvador, El Salvador. She is currently working on a graphic memoir titled Colonia, based on her life in El Salvador during the country’s civil war.
Abby Lacelle is a feminist writer and a PhD Candidate at the University of Toronto. Her work centers contemporary literature and Reproductive Justice. She is a founding editor for the Toronto Review.