Earlier this year I wrote about the important maternal mortality art work of Chicago-based artist and activist, Michelle Hartney and her plan to sew 1,200 hospital gowns for her performance art, MOTHER’S RIGHT —  one for every woman who died in the US during childbirth in 2013.

Hartney will perform this piece on September 7th at the Daley Center in Chicago at Improving Birth’s “Liberate Labor” rally.

Today she announced on Instagram that the 1200 gowns have been completed. The photo stuck out to me not only because the gowns are finished, but because 1200 women died during childbirth in America two years ago, the highest number of any developed nation.

While there is a national push to reduce maternal mortality numbers in the US, those numbers are still moving in the wrong direction as Dr. Priya Agrawal, Executive Director of Merck for Mothers, recently said in our interview in our Maternal Health Heroes series.

See more of Michelle Hartney’s work on Instagram at instagram.com/michellehartneyart.

And, follow our ongoing series about maternal health in the United States.