Alison has used the image of classical Greek art (the model of classicism in renaissance times) before herself as when she posed herself as the Venus de Milo. Her disability is part of her identity and if art is about invoking thought on the human condition, amongst other things, then the body she was born into is essential to that process. Classic Greek nudes were all about archetypes and Alison is definitely an archetype for our age.
I think it works on so many levels though not just a pastiche of classical sculpture. It challenges a tyrannical beauty industry. And I bet it gets the goat of that whole swathe of society who think breast feeding in public is disgusting, or that any presentation of the female form not specifically eroticised for their privileged viewing is somehow pornographic in their eyes.
It's also going to be the most widely viewed picture of disability in a country where the majority of it's disabled citizens are still hidden from the mainstream in every sector. People here have to look at the disability straight on, not avert their eyes or look away in shame, or embarrassment or fright. But most of all the disability has not stopped Alison doing the one amazing thing that we have all done, something that until very recently disabled people were still having operations performed on them to stop. She has created a new life within her, disabled or not. The disability is at once central and meaningless. (Cliché police!) The idea and statement is of femininity triumphing, not just personally but also on a much wider universal level. Women rule the world as they create life. All the rest is a clumsy desperate rush to try compete, to matter. The position of her head is strong, but not arrogant. She?s depicted as a goddess. Sorry of the purple prose but it is a very poetic idea even if I'm not doing it justice. What a daft rant! lol