Contemporary art isn’t shy about discussing abortions. 

And yet, this art hesitates to depict the actual act of getting an abortion. Despite being a hottest-button issue for lifetimes, how many of us have ever experienced for ourselves the details of what going through the abortion process is actually like?

Well, April and The Years understand art’s power to show audiences the full truth of what we might not be forced to endure in our own lives, namely: illegal abortions.

In the new movie April, the camera remains still on the patient’s body as we watch and hear an abortion from beginning to end. And while The Years doesn’t stage an abortion, this new play describes one in painstaking detail, from first to aftermath.