A Doctor Paints Motherhood in an Arlington Barn

A wrong turn came at the right time for Eva Zasloff. In the fall of 2020, she was driving near her home in Arlington when she took a right turn one street late—and then spotted a For Rent sign by a beautiful 19th-century barn. Now, that barn is her studio, where she paints in the morning light after getting her three kids ready for school and before visiting her first patients of the day. A physician whose unique practice focuses on the fourth trimester, Zasloff exclusively makes house calls, providing newborn and postpartum care in the comfort of families’ homes. It’s work that finds its way into her paintings.

“Almost every day, I’m hearing a birth story from a brand-new family,” Zasloff says. “And then every morning, it’s kind of releasing out of me in the form of art.” She fills canvases with rounded shapes that seem to stretch and swell, hinting at changing bodies, dividing cells, and movements in utero. Her process is intuitive and improvisational; lately, she’s been experimenting with natural pigments. “I’m loving creating tempera with ingredients that smell wonderful and have a history for me, like sandalwood or cinnamon, and then using the binder of a raw egg.” Material made to nourish and protect new life yields “a really playful but also metaphoric medium.”

Zasloff at work. / Courtesy

Before deciding to go to medical school, Zasloff majored in visual arts, and even as a child, she prioritized making time for art. “I’d be hanging out with a friend, and I’d have to interrupt the playdate and give her something to do so I could spend a few minutes working on my stuff,” she recalls. “That’s kind of what the barn is for me now”—a dedicated workspace that helps her carve out time to create. It’s also a gathering place: Zasloff hosts exhibitions of her own work and that of other local artists, complete with festive openings where even the littlest art lovers are welcome.

evazasloff.com

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