Linda Molleman, Chantal Molleman (69)

Photos of Chantal Molleman who was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2009. The photos were taken by her sister, artist Linda Molleman.

Chantal Molleman writes:

IT...

Vulnerable, destroyed body and mind, I feel like shit all the time.
What does IT want from me ? Why me ?
I’m not myself anymore, IT doesn’t belong to me, I don’t want it anymore !

Diagnosed with breast cancer, MAY 2009.
One large huge breast is a purple foreign object. It doesn’t fit with the rest of my whole person, just hanging there like a big prune with an eye on it, a dead eye with no soul, staring at the rest of my private parts, bald and useless, no hair anywhere !

I’m submitted to twelve chemo’s and thirty three radiations, ‘Gamma rays’ entering my deep soul and burn the flesh away of my once nice breast, a rose blossom, what a shame...
My entire being changing aggressively, I’m very much in pain, very angry at IT and I can’t stop it.

FOR NINE MONTHS I SIT IN A BALLOON ALONE, NO ESCAPE POSSIBLE.
The world outside not existing because it is not my world anymore. I’m powerless... so horrible aching inside and out, and yet I’m searching for the meaning of all this.

Dead sick smoking my lovely cigarette which I cherish deeply, my one and only escape, my only moment for a while, making me happy and ‘ normal’ for a few minutes. My cigarette... How stupid can I be?

Look, the mirror tells me how beautiful I am, still am, bald, yet I can’t see it.
Do I have to surrender, accept and suffer?
Fading concentration, loss of control, I cry it out. Help me ! The mess inside kills me slowly.
There is no hope in my head, my Picasso coloured breast burning continuously like a monster... I want to die !
There is my lovely cigarette, my only companion, killing me too.

With a little needle I try to prick my balloon, find a small hole, how tiny it may be and run away from my captured body. Yet, I do not find the way out to escape from this filthy shell.
No concentration. Perhaps another cigarette? Yes ! What the heck, I am dying anyway.

This fat monster with beautiful blue eyes, crying for attention, credibility and pity, and yet I don’t want it. Screaming for hope and understanding,any encouragement to survive.
Many questions in that bald head of mine crawling around in my brains for so long already. My cigarette ... not real, not logical. I take another nicotine escape.

I’m so tired, burned out and please let me see my grandchild one day. My beloved son who I adore and means the world to me; Please...
Another chemo, number 12 and I say NO ! Enough now, I can’t and will not have it. No more poison.
My body and mind refuse it, and I believe in myself, no struggle for live anymore. Final countdown.

Little things, a flower, the sun, nature and above all my music, my operas.They are all there for me, just for me.
My cigarette.

Regaining power inside by meditation, little things come back to me. Small things that make my life worth living for, appreciation of futilities, I see it all in a different way now.
I’m becoming a master at putting life into perspective.

Don’t take IT so hard on yourself !
My balloon ruptures, I fly away from my cocoon. It’s a renaissance.
I slowly accept the person. I become a beautiful person for myself and other people.
I see again. Eyes were wide shut !
I rejected IT, the ugly Duck, and if IT strikes again, so it will be.

But I’m still here ... with my cigarette.


CHANTAL

Chantal Molleman, TEXT, October 2010.

Linda Molleman, PHOTOS, March 2010.

www.lindamolleman.be

Anonymous (68)

HPV

I got the news a week ago –
The high-risk HPV test came back positive.
My ob/gyn didn’t say anything more
Except that I should return in six months.
No consultation; no explanation.
Just that I needed to return in six months.
They were very rude and unsympathetic.

Said diagnosis didn’t include
Any education about its implications.
Knowledge alone is not empowerment.
I had to learn more for myself.
The Internet is rife with falsehoods & misunderstandings;
Misinterpretation and scary stories reign supreme.
Researching HPV online, I was horrified by what I found.

As I learned more I was fraught with worry.
HPV causes all kinds of cancers;
Many don’t have obvious symptoms and go undiagnosed until too late.
HPV is considered a common STI, but I haven’t “sowed my wild oats”
And my only sex partner (in both skin contact and the actual act)
Is the man that I married – he is all that I have known.
But that isn’t true the other way around.

Women are told that they have no way of knowing where they got this.
Some are even told that they don’t need to inform their male partner -
That it won’t affect him and he doesn’t need to know.
He can obliviously keep spreading it around
Without the knowledge that he is doing so
And without ever being blamed for anything.
This leaves him and his future loves / conquests at risk.

Men are rarely acknowledged as carriers
And are not tested to see if they have this.
Double standards demonize women
For any sexual encounters, and shame them.
Once shamed, they don’t talk about it.
It becomes a private matter and their own dark secret,
Their own personal pain, problem and worry.

So the attitude still prevails:
Boys will be boys,
And girls are solely responsible for their own sexual encounters
Whether they get a STI or get pregnant.
Some view HPV as punishment from God for promiscuity.
They imply that cervical & other cancers evidence that punishment.
But why am I being punished for something I didn’t do?

Those who tested positive can feel alone
Even while knowing that 50 – 80% of women are estimated
To have been diagnosed at some point or another.
I have yet to meet another woman who’s gone through this,
Although I haven't talked with many out of my own shame.
I feel dirty, tainted, and undesirable and am fearful for my health and future.
Education is sorely lacking; both women and men deserve better.

~Anonymous

The HPV Support Network:
anymothersdaughter

Inne Haine (67)

Inne writes about this cartoon:

For girls, growing up has never been easy. These days it seems even more complex. There are plenty of role models around and often girls lack guidance in shaping their identities. The beautiful, photo shopped faces we know from advertising have become the norm of who we should be as women it seems. Young girls are being rushed to grow up physically, so they can step into the vital, sexy, consuming world of the ‘perfect’ adult shown in the media. How can their minds keep up? How can they see through that? That’s why in the storyline, I allow for the little girl to be just that, a little girl …unaffected by this kind of inner conflict between who she is and who she ‘should’ be.
I remember from my childhood how strong the influence of the group is on the individual. You better try hard to fit in, or so it seems at first. After leaving school, that peer pressure falls away. Suddenly you can be yourself. Who’s perceived as ‘weird’ in school, may very well be special and unique ...

Inne Haine on YouTube

Annemiek Mullenders (66)

-battered-(triptych)

Annemiek writes:

After some time of feeling unwell, one day I just lost consciousness and woke up three weeks later in the ICU at the hospital. I was on life support and hooked up to many other devices. I couldn’t do anything and didn’t understand what was going on. My body battered: a large untidy scar where my chest was cut open and tubes and wires going in and out of it. What happened was, I had a massive pulmonary embolism and multiple cardiac arrests, CPR, lack of oxygen causing brain damage, a 7-hour emergency heart/lung surgery with complications and organ failure and residue damage to my muscles and nerves as sequelae. So I was told. Nobody expected that I’d ever wake up at all. I'm (still) confused and in a lot of pain. After a difficult rehabilitation, two years later, I’m trying to find out who this new person is that I became and what I still cán do with all my (new) limitations. Gently, carefully I’ve started to paint, draw, cut, paste and I’m finding a way to process it all.

This triptych shows my body with its scars like faces showing the emotions I went through: surprise/incomprehension - confusion /anger – acceptance/surrender.

Annemiek's mail art call&blog

Aunia Kahn (65)

-salutary absorption-

Aunia writes:

When faced with fears I tend to be drawn directly into art, to get out the fear, frustrations and the overall feeling of lack of control – I have control with my art.

My family has suffered many Cancer scares, and many deaths associated with the disease breast. Brain, breast and kidney are to name a few. Breast Cancer runs on both sides of my family, and we carry the gene as well.

My gynecologist asked me told me at 30 I was going to have to go get a mammogram for the lumps she found in both breasts, due to her concern and the breast cancer risks in my family. I was devastated at the news, the fear of “maybe something was wrong with me” and the “what if’s” that come along after watching my mother go though Breast Cancer in her early 40’s and to be fighting stage 4 Bone Cancer in her late 40’s. (She is doing well)

I went home and created this piece of work as I waited for my mammogram appointment, which was a week later.

Everything came back normal, and I am healthy and fine but I am much more conscious about self breast checking and making people aware that Cancer, in any form can happen to anyone, even the most healthy, young and bright. So we must take care of our body, mind and spirit so that we do not give Cancer or any other illness a place to materialize and grow.

auniakahn.com

Maureen Piggins (64)

-Back and front of Maureen's postcard for A Book About Death, NYC, 2009-

Maureen writes:

I created several works and poems about my mother's illness and death from breast cancer, and consolidated much of this into an artist's book entitled "Echo". Many images represent the body (mine) in psychological portraits, while others are more literal in the interpretation of the body (my mother's) during illness. The two images above were exhibited in postcard format for the first "A Book About Death" show at the Emily Harvey Gallery in New York.

-Roots-

The image above, "Roots" is a work that represents my simultaneous connection to death and life. My body is between these two states, grief connecting me to my deceased parents and strength and joy to my son. This image also appears in postcard format in the "Ray Johnson and A Book About Death" exhibit. I've included the back of the postcard here as well, which deals with my father in the later stages of dementia.

maureenpiggins.com

Jennifer Weigel (63)

Images from The Life Blood Exhibit/Menstruation Art:

-Blossom-

-ComingOfAge2-

Jennifer writes:

Why make art about menstruation? Menstruation is still a taboo topic among many cultures. Many women are taught to be ashamed of their bodies and feel dirty when they are menstruating. There are still many myths surrounding menstruation, and both normal and potentially life-threatening conditions are too often not discussed, leaving individual women to wonder whether or not anything is wrong with their bodies whenever they experience any changes (sometimes even including menarche at the onset - many a girl has learned from a school nurse that what she is experiencing is normal). But menstruation shouldn’t been seen as something dirty, deviant or wrong - it is a natural function of the female body and provides evidence of women’s ability to carry children and to give birth to new life.

By drawing attention to the female body and to the menstrual cycle, artists are able to comment on this life-giving aspect of womanhood and to celebrate and/or show their discontent with their own bodies and cycles. Also in exploring this theme, artists are able to offer commentary on their experiences, confront stereotypes & assumptions and educate one another about things that are too often left unsaid. Here are some images of a couple of my artworks celebrating menstruation, including an altered dress called Blossom and an assemblage entitled Coming of Age. Please feel free to look at some more of my art on my website and to check out Life Blood Exhibit, a show about menstruation that I curated in St. Louis and hope will travel nationally.

jenniferweigelart.com
The Menstruation Series

lifebloodexhibit.com
lifebloodexhibit.blogspot.com

Elena Cortés (62)

-AURA-

Óleo sobre lienzo, 81 x 60 cm (cada uno)
Oil on canvas, 81 x 60 cm (each panel), 2010

Elena escribe, Elena writes:

Presento y represento un cúmulo de situaciones con la mujer como personaje principal, que intentan gracias al diálogo entre espectador y obra, una posible definición de la identidad propia de la mujer y su erotismo.
Una pintura basada en la sutileza, que sugiera más y que describa menos. Una pintura de manchas y fundidos que nos traslade al conflicto entre desaparición y presencia y que seduzca con su simple esencia indefinida.

I present and represent a combination of situations with women as main characters, who try through dialogue between viewer and work, for a possible definition of the identity of the woman and her eroticism.A painting based on subtlety, suggesting more and describing less.
A painting of blots and of fading that moves us towards the conflict between presence and disappearance and that appeals by its simple indefinite essence.

www.elenacortes.net

Monique Donckers (61)

Monique writes:

I was diagnosed with breast cancer in January 2008 at the age of 54 ( I was about to throw a big birthday-party as my year of birth is 1954, but this turned out differently). I had a mastectomy and chemo and radiation treatment.

I had many difficulties getting used to the one-breasted-body, and the boldness. It was hard to deal with the person in the mirror, so I started to collect wigs in all sorts of colors and shapes, and took photographs of every transformation of my body during the 8 months of treatment.

I am a sculptress really, but as I was too sick to do the heavy work, I tried to make some oil-paintings from the photographs that I took.

So this is what you see here, a story of a short period in my life, where the body changed drastically, and where I became estranged from both my body and myself.

I am happy to say that today I feel re-born, this whole experience has made me very much more aware of ‘life’.

www.moniquedonckers.be

Cristina Taniguchi (60)

-Dimension of fear-

80x180cm, oil on canvas, 2010

CROW

Crow. I get distance.
The clouds dark beyond timeless
Sphere.
Obliterated wishes.
I screw life.

Crow it is you I find
Hang yourself.
Do it for I cannot wait to see
Your eyes frozen
for a thousand times.
I keep denying life, for I …dead.

Crow. Dead I am for multi-cycles
of life span.
Fitted against oddities.
A lonely soul
Who dreams of timeless
Memory that consoles
No boundary of sanity

Crow. You could have accounted
the beginning of light and dark,
of the scariness of space,
of how it feels to float between ages,
and… the river of time.
My river of time goes here and now.

Crow. Nowhere could I set my feet
Grounded
For there is nothing to grip.
If there was a soul it should be mine.
But on my own I comprehend that exit
is an illusion
My soul does not response against this
truth.
Crow.

©Cristina “Kitty” Taniguchi

Heather Horton (59)

-Self Portrait, Acute-

-Self Portrait, Poignant-

-Self Portrait, Renewal-

Heather writes:

The body is a landscape constantly in motion. Like tectonic plates shifting our skin, bones and beings are always on the move. I aim to capture a moment of that transition, be it painful or joyful. I seek to look into my own eyes when I work on self-portraiture and examine just what is underneath it all, literally. The layers of paint really are like skin...they are organic and never straight...always arcing, always softening, always pushing ahead or receding back. It is those continually fluctuating moments that intrigue me the most and beckon to be caught on canvas...

Heather Horton's Blog

Heather Horton on Twitter

heatherhorton.com

Sejal Patel (58)

Red, Purple, and Blue (2003-2004)

Red, Purple, and Blue is a performance-based photo/video installation on the implications of color: culturally, socially, and psychologically. In Indian culture, red transforms the life of a girl, as she is surrounded by the color red on her wedding day, bringing her love, strength, prosperity, and welfare. Despite my American citizenship, as an Indian woman it is expected that I marry and the marriage be arranged. The concept of arranged marriage is not foreign to me, but its familiarity does nothing to limit the horror behind it. The progression from Red to Blue is a remedial realization of self and its capabilities after experiencing the absence of self and identity. I use the colors as a means to initiate a conversation. A conversation about my life’s dreams, fears, and confrontations. I see the three colors as shades of my different moods or the illustrations of my emotional stance through the different stages of my life.

Click RED to watch the video

patelsejal.com

Andrea Bonfils (57)

Andrea writes:

My work is reflects an appreciation of the balance of nature and how we are intertwined. Our ability to heal and effect change, is in my view, synonymous to our relationship with the natural world.

www.andreaartstudio.com

Irit Rabinowits (56)

-from the series 'Blue Paintings,' Untitled-

-from the series 'Naive Painting,' Garden of Freedom-

Irit writes on her site:

Irit Rabinowits's art deals with the process of defining a sexual identity, starting with early adolescence in the 'Blue Paintings' series, which are painted in cold and reserved colors conveying a sensation of detachment and isolation. Through the revelation and enjoyment derived from the beauty and sexuality of the female body in the 'Wood Painting' series, which are warm-color paintings drawn on wood. And finally in the 'Naive Painting' series which simply celebrates love within an intimate relationship in a colorful and joyful manner.

Irit Rabinowits

Moira Antonello (55)

-cuerpos-

moiraantonello.com

Michelle DeMarco (54)

-self portrait from the series about caryatids-

Michelle writes:

I believe we are living in and through a growing, changing situation which opens up towards new possibilities and that is transformed as it develops. The process is part of the meaning making and most assuredly part of art making. We are not separate from our physical experience of life.

Here is a snippet from a series of work I did about caryatids: (harmony and creation)

In as much as I am a part of nature I can be consciously involved in this evolution, which is to say, in my own self definition and reconstruction. Through my direct connection to the earth I reclaim an intimacy with the mystery and find harmony in creation. Beauty exists through this harmony, it is in me and I am surrounded by it. Beauty is a greater sense of grace which calls me to lean in closer. Beauty is not a thing it is a conversation which includes the world I touch - the world where I live and work. It includes the human body, the earth body and the body politic and with this new definition is delivered a compassionate ethos. An ethos that remembers how we cherish each other and move into beauty.

michelledemarco.com

Susan Brenner (53)

3 pieces from the series "This is History ... that is not over."

-Posing-

1990, oil on canvas in 2 panels, 73 1/4"x77"

-Beauty Secrets-

1991, oil on canvas in 2 panels, 50” x 102”

-The Reproduction of Hysteria Cruxifiement-

1991, oil on canvas, 50"x72"

Susan writes:

Issues related to women’s identity and their bodies have long been a concern of mine, and this concern has sometimes manifested itself in overt ways in my work. In the late 1980’s and early 1990’s I was par­ticularly interested in the language of gesture, the pose, within figurative representation.In 1990-91 this interest led me to create a body of work, focused on hysteria, using late-nineteenth century medical photographs as visual source material. Three works from this series are shown here. You can see additional pieces at www.susanbrenner.net

This is history…that is not over includes two installation works, a series of paintings, and a set of drawings with accompanying text panels. This work offers a sardonic view of hysteria as a defining metaphor for femininity. It draws parallels between the world of contemporary advertising and the nineteenth century institutions that produced and reproduced hysteria as a spec­tacle. It is built around a series of late-nineteenth century photographs of women institutionalized for hysteria at the Paris hospital la Salpetrière under the care of Dr. Jean Martin Charcot. They are disturbing and compelling images, presenting a picture of woman as an exotic other, an irrational being, a victim, simultaneously powerful and powerless. I appropriated these images, layering and juxtaposing them with frag­ments of historical and contemporary materials, with the intention of raising questions about the nature of identity.

susanbrenner.com

Birgit Huttemann-Holz (52)

-Burn in-encaustic
(With numb hands- straight to the heart)-

self portrait, 31.5x58", encaustic 2010

Due to repetitive back problems (herniated discs), I suffer annually in spring from major pain and immobility. This year it triggered a cervical radiculopathy resulting in a numb right hand and the need to look up not down (otherwise I am in serious pain). So I needed to alter my work position and my pace of work. Of course I can not stay away- and might as well have prolonged my suffering and healing process. But that is life as an artist... a self consuming flame???

-Inscapes-

The video narrates the philosophical/psychological question of identity and how this manifests itself in body language/ portraits.

www.brightstroke.com

Marianita Faraino (51)

-Stammered Breath-

36 x 30, acrylic on panel.

Marianita writes:

Breathing ... breathing in, breathing out ... simple, automatic ... from our first breath, we take for granted this unconscious act. We experience joy, we breath rapidly. We experience pain or sorrow, we breath in slowly, with a deep healing cadence. We are sustained by breath.

I have asthma. I am a painter who can not work with oils when an attack has flared. Suffocating, I pull out the acrylics and, with ribs in a constant vice, I draw on the strength of womanhood and bring forth an image of determination ... exhaling fully my voice, my thoughts, my being ... inhale again and I am sustained.

Marianita Faraino

Bibiana Padilla Maltos (50)

Throughout my life, my body has changed and I have several scars to prove it, both physical and emotional.

My first surgery happened only days after I was born. I had an umbilical hernia that I can barely see the scar of now, but when I was a kid it sort of had the shape of the Sun "would you like to see my Sun?" I remember asking my family. My feet didn't have enough arch so I wore little boots (which I loved!) but sometimes I didn't pay enough attention when running and fell, hitting my head, so I have a bulky scar in my lower skull that I showed proudly when, years after, I used to shave my head. Once I had to get a tetanus shot because I got hit with a tennis racket and opened my eyelid, I have a tiny scar for that. Years after I realized how lucky I was, if I had been hit lower I could have lost my eye!

I have a scar in my ankle and my knee for ironing my uniform skirt on the floor (don't ask why, I still don't know what I was thinking). Being asthmatic I'm always concerned about the air flow, the weather, the pollution, and very -VERY- familiarized with hospitals, nurses and blood works. I had oxygen therapy (inhaler therapy?), got poked for blood allergy testing more times that I can count, got pinched with cortisone shots more times that I can count, up to the point that nowadays if I need to I can explain someone how to do it for me and feel confident that they will do it right or do it myself (what a weird comfort is that?). I can also tell the people in the lab which of my veins is the good one, and give them alternate options if they screw up.

I never really check my breasts for lumps and such. I remember the one day that I did check, I couldn't find anything until, wait a minute! There it was!!! I ran to the doctor, and said it was the size of a lentil. We didn't know what it was, so he told me to wait and come back a month after. What if it is? What if it isn't? A month past by and my lump had grown to be 3 centimeters. Surgery was scheduled. My surgeon left me a very fine scar that no one can tell it's there.

I have always had very small breasts, but to me they are beautiful because they are mine. I didn't know what would happen and thinking I might have one removed for good I started making casts of it; after that I started filling them up with silicone; after that I thought I needed to put colored marbles as lumps. Results were back, and it was not cancer. I kept the prototypes, which I can't find now. I was lucky, again.

In my everyday job (you know, the one that pays the bills) I had to do audits. While traveling to visit a vendor, my car got out of control and smacked against a semi-truck. It was a very Hollywoodesque moment. Car and semi-truck got off the road. Car in flames. Legs not responding. Crawling out of the car to ask for help (luckily I was conscious). I had knee surgery. Again, I was not only lucky but blessed, how many people alive do you know who've had accidents hitting semi-trucks? I cannot name a single one. I couldn't walk for months and when I did I got the coolest cane. I have 2 centipede scars in my knee and started to tell people what a bad-ass I was that I even have scars to show (as a joke, of course).

It is funny women don't talk about their woman problems. Once you go through one, a lot of them tell you they've been through the same or something similar. Last year I was pregnant. My first pregnancy-doctors-visit I was told it might be more than one baby. I was huge. I came back the next day for an ultra sound. And there it wasn't: only my heart was beating. And there they were: at least 5 fibroids the size of a grapefruit. I had an obvious miscarriage and got a treatment for fibroids explained to me. I don't remember being sad, I remember wanting to be over all that and ready to go. That didn't happen. I got an injection treatment which was an induced menopause, believe me when I say I cannot wait for NOT to go through menopause again. The five big fibroids got reduced to garbanzo size and were removed in two surgeries. Lost the pregnancy. Lost fibroids. Lost bone mass. Lost my mind. And now I am ready to go.

The last three events have left the biggest scars. I can't even show them, but they are there.

padillamaltos.blogspot.com

Maeshelle West-Davies (49)

In 2004 Maeshelle wrote:

"frigive release" is a series of 6 photographs exploring suicide.

Upon hearing the words, "I’m not ready." I thought I was going to die. My body shut down. But I lived. Then I just wanted to die. Even 6 months later I am wrestling with thoughts of not wanting to live. I’m scared to kill myself. I don’t know if it would improve things. I just know that most of the time I don’t want to be here or anywhere. I just want to be with him. without him I can find no existence. I feel as though a portion of me is missing. It’s the portion that holds joy, laughter, motivation, happiness......the good things I used to be....my soul.

So, at the moment death seems very appetizing. That’s why I chose to make the photos pretty, like a fashion magazine. My emotions keep trying to sell it to me. I could escape this never ceasing pain. I could stop being a drain on my friends and family. My head keeps stopping me from buying it.

The images are designed to draw you in and then to disturb you. Kind of wake you up and bring you back to reality. Suicide is the cause of more deaths in Germany than car accidents. In the States it ranks as one the higher than murder. And yet, it brings such shock. It is a taboo subject. Feeling isolated is one of the biggest triggers of suicide. Because it’s something not to be discussed, you end up feeling even more isolated because you can’t talk to anyone about it. When it is mentioned, the looks say it all. I’m not trying to normalize it or promote it. I’m just trying to show how it can look like the answer. On the contrary, information shows that women in particular, more often than not, fail, leaving them with new traumas to deal with. Not all of these traumas are physical. There’s also the stigma to deal with, some of it external, but a lot of it internal. How could I be having these feelings? As my father said to me, "That’s not an option," thinking that would stop me. Perhaps for him, it isn't an option. I never thought it would be for me. All he did was reinforce years of conditioning of how damaged I am. After much searching, I now know that wanting to die is really just wanting to end the pain. When the coping mechanisms aren’t keeping up with the pain, sometimes suicide results. If someone comes to you and says they want to die, part of them wants to live. This is the part that’s calling out. Sometimes just admitting the feelings can give some strength to the coping department.

Even when I was working on the project, I tried to hide these feelings from myself. I suppressed them, finding loads of other reasons why I had to do these particular images. One of the reasons was I was killing off the part of me that feels. The part of me that loves and wants to be loved. I know I will never find another love like this. So I figured if I could kill this part of me, it wouldn’t hurt so much. I could pick up what was left and carry on with my life....strong in my art. If I am truthful, it is the knowledge of how very special and strong this love is and the hope of his return that keeps me alive.

All of the images were shot in my sublet in Berlin. I have left the place where people know me. I can choose to tell or not to tell people about my depression and they can accept me or not. I am in limbo.........effectively homeless......having lost everything.

-frigive release-

-jump-

I have never wanted children......until this man. With him it seems an extension of our union and perfectly natural. Also having children seems part of life in Denmark. In my culture i saw it as an end to life, a burden......something to hold you back......something an artist couldn’t afford. This is shot from my balcony. The, whatever that thing is that kids play on, is a constant reminder of what I’ve gained and lost. I have difficulty walking down the street and seeing happy families. My gut wrenches when I see a father and child, knowing he will never play with our children.

The fallen leaves are not only the obvious......oh, how the mighty have fallen, but symbolize the oncoming winter... hibernation my only respite. I am unable to hold a job because of the lack of concentration and the inability to handle even the slightest stress..........symptoms brought on by the depression. My loss of self and my constant thinking about how I could have foreseen and prevented this........guilt, another symptom...........keeps me from interacting with people for any period of time.

-overdose-

Of course the most glamorous is the overdose...just ask Marilyn or Judy. One Sunday I was walking down the street and I came across a pile of glass from a car windshield. It was glistening in the sun, like diamonds. I knew then that was what I should vomit. I later read that when you od on Tylenol, you throw up green, luminous vomit. You don’t die, you just pass out. Someone finds you, rushes you to the hospital. You awake, having changed your mind, only to discover irreparable organ damage. For 5 days you and your family get to sit around and suffer until you die. How’s that for an exit?

-stab-

I shot this on the fourth month anniversary of the breakup. I had fully intended to pamper myself. I got a bottle of wine, some flowers, and some special food. All of it was left untouched. I felt I had to do this piece. Open communication was the cornerstone of our relationship. On the wall are texts sent during the last year. Such beautiful words. Such comforting, uplifting, empowering words. I love you. Jeg elsker dig. Just three of the many words that meant so much........and then from nowhere...knus..... Danish duality. A warm greeting of rubbing cheeks........I used to love it because it was so intimate and yet so innocent.........and it doesn’t exist in my culture......then a new meaning..........to crush. Words that had been so wonderful now turned to stabbing pain. The object I am using to stab myself is a part of a wind-chime made from metal and ceramic. Each piece has words sent to me in text. It used to hang in the bathroom window. When the wind would blow, his words were renewed. It always brought a feeling of warmth and a smile to my face when I heard the sound. Now it is in the sublet bathroom. Some pieces are on the wall, placed so as not to touch. Others in a glass vases. It lies dismantled..........silenced. the particular piece reads rest of my life.

-choke-

The same scarf, given as an anniversary gift, that used to keep out the cold, is now choking the life out of me. The items I surrounded myself with to close the distance now only magnify it. I can’t put them in a box, as suggested. I can’t snap out of it. I can’t accept that he is just young and doesn’t know what he is doing. I can’t stop my heart from feeling. Each heartbeat flows with warmth and love. If unbroken, the love would fill the veins and nourish the body, but instead broken, it floods out, poisoning all it touches.

Gift means both marriage and poison in Danish.

-wrist slit-

Again the gift and the poison. In old times and even today in some cultures, it is customary to bleed off an illness. Many times bad blood was replaced with new in an effort to cure. The candles glow in ritual while the clean lines of the bathroom tiles mimic the clinical nature of a surgery. If I could I would cut myself and bleed this poison, the bad blood gushing out in ribbons, adorning a wonderful present, my life back.

maeshelle west-davies

Angela Fama (48)

-Mirrorface 09: Angela-

Angela writes:

Almost 4 years ago, just after my 30th birthday, I was driving my black '76 firebird, when I got T-boned by a bus that resulted in nearly killing me (a mm away... quick coma, fractured skull and a brain injury to boot). I am a photographer, who had been straying from my real love (ART!), driving to an editorial shot for a designer friend, focusing on the world of commercial, so far from that real love... same pot, yet at the heart of it, totally different soup. I also ended up having my left shooting eye, the one right where the fractured skull was underneath, blood glued shut and close to being totally out of commission. Needless to say, it was a little shocking when I woke up in a hospital with a neck brace and a lot of people (family, friends, nurses) all standing around in a half moon staring at me... also needless to say, after a long, slow, mellow recovery, mostly all in my head (aka brain injury), the accident resulted in serious life changes for me. Thankfully and luckily enough, more in my mind and heart than my the body and it's abilities. I ended up with a scar on my forehead, a few other facial scars that are barely visible and everything working just fine. Brain injuries are a strange event, they take a long, non-visually aided (no broken foot to watch heal or explain the pain), time and in the beginning, it's like being a really smart kid while you're brain is busy healing. You can stand, talk, move, hang out at home but you might not remember the intelligent, revealing conversation you just had and simply don't have the brain energy to care for all the walls and conceived realities we build up around our lives, our minds are too busy healing to get into our heads and twist and create messy ideas or concepts. It took me over a year to get back at things fully and since then I have been switching my focus back to my first love, art. This decision resulted in showing at my first "real" gallery, Elliot Louis, and since then, my current body of work, Mirrorface, which I shot while still taking things "easy" in recovery, has just shown solo in 2 collaborating "real" galleries (Grace Gallery and ON MAIN). Thanks to my shock, I have the pride and confidence to say again, I am an artist, first and foremost. We only live once in this world and every second counts.

Angela Fama

Summer Geraghty (47)

-From the Project: "Self-Test Necklaces I, II, III", Self-Test III-

Multi-media installation

Summer writes:

I wish not to be myself; not human, not made of skin, not static and dormant within one mind and body set.

My pieces are not imagery; they are equations of my personality. With varying media, I explore divergent areas of my psyche. My works are the manifestations of my history, thoughts and theories. Religiosity, abuse, abjection, identity, stages of life and ephemerality are sectors that preoccupy my mind. All my pieces are forms of portraiture; they emanate from personal experiences and then broaden with others’.

Self-Test Necklace III materialized from a Hirudotherapy session with ten leeches. Documenting both the session and the aftermath was vital because the notion of healing is as important as the act of endurance. The singularity of the experience invoked the understanding that any living organism requires sustenance and that I was happy to become the host. Wishing to renovate the parasitic nature of humanity by transferring my position to that of the host, I allowed the leeches to drink from me. As Hirudotherapy is used for medicinal purposes, the act of bloodletting is necessary for the rejuvenation of new blood. As I allowed this to transpire, my thought process was to document it as the beginning of a cathartic process, one that resulted in a five day photography record in which the bites and bruising healed. The main aspect to abjection, for me, is the catharsis that emerges from it.

Summer Geraghty on myartspace

Sally Piller (46)

-Wrist Surgery-

moku hanga woodblock print

Sally writes:

I always had very strong hands and love to use them in intricate ways. I am a printmaker by trade and my specialty is making woodblock prints. I've been making them for about 35 years. Hands are so essential to the life of a human being, particularly an artist. I took my hands for granted and after hammering away and using hand pressure to create a self portrait woodblock print, they started to go numb, then came searing pain at night. I had given myself a nasty case of carpal tunnel syndrome. I know, nothing to compare to some of the life threatening experiences of other stories in this series, but it surprised me that I had been so careless with a part of my body that is so integral to my identity. Both hands were affected, not surprisingly, because when one got tired I'd switch to the other. I've always been somewhat ambidextrous. So I had surgery on one hand, the right, after which they both improved. I guess this happens. Nerves are funny things. My hands still go numb though. And they are not nearly as strong as before. Artists! Don't take your hands for granted!

This moku hanga woodblock print is called "Wrist Surgery". The broken feather represents my messed up hand.

Chris Aerfeldt (45)

'Red, red heart' from the series 'Silver threads and golden needles (cannot mend this heart of mine)'.

About the series, Chris writes:

For some time I have been intrigued by small 17th century Dutch genre paintings, such as those by Vermeer, Teniers, van Mieris, and Dou, depicting women in the home. I have been mulling over the meanings and stories behind these paintings (by men) of beautiful yet moralising pictures (of women).
This entire series 'Silver threads and golden needles (cannot mend this heart of mine)' this piece is a part of, can be traced back to one small painting that I saw in the Musee Fabre in Montpellier, the Enfileuse de perles (which translates as ‘Female pearl threader’) and is by the 17th century Dutch artist Frans van Mieris. In it we see a young woman in the privacy of her own boudoir, sitting at a table looking towards us whilst threading a string of pearls, with her maid in the background. Each time I see it I am transfixed by the woman with the ambiguous expression on her face, trying to work out what is inside her head.
I started doing some research ... In French the verb enfiler (to thread), which is at the root of enfileuse, has a double meaning, and also refers to the sexual act. The eye of the needle is called a chas in French, which when spoken sounds exactly like chat (cat). This can be extended to chatte (a female cat), which is the French equivalent of the English ‘pussy’. So threading pearls may not be as innocent as it appears.

www.aerfeldt.com