Creating A Personal Healing Image; A Series By Maria DiFranco

Creating a Personal Healing Image

“This publication was created by artist Maria DiFranco in collaboration with current female cancer patients at the Stephanie Spielman Comprehensive Breast Center at the James Cancer Hospital. In one hour painting sessions, DiFranco and the participants explored how imagery and the process of art making can play a role in their remission. These participants positively impact the lives of other patients by sharing their paintings in this book, which has been donated to cancer hospitals.”

The participatory project titled “Creating a Personal Healing Image”, approved by the Internal Review Board (IRB) at The Ohio State University’s Office of Responsible Research Practices in 2015, and funded by The Ohio State University Alumni Grant for Graduate Research and Scholarship, provided free painting workshops, facilitated by artist Maria DiFranco, to current patients at the Stefanie Speilman Comprehensive Breast Center, James Cancer Hospital at the Ohio State University. Inspired by DiFranco’s own experience as a cancer patient, the project intended to give female patients an alternative to the common magazine selection at OBGYN Oncology offices, which often contain articles on health and beauty (difficult subjects for cancer patients to encounter). The “Creating a Personal Healing Image” project had two objectives: to empower the participants to engage in a therapeutic activity that betters the lives of their fellow patients, and to provide readers with a momentary distraction from their stressful experience with a book of colorful and unique compositions. 

The outcome was a book of gorgeous paintings that illustrate a metaphorical expression of the patients’ experience with disease. The participants cast light on how the process of imagemaking can play a role in the emotional healing of cancer patients. There is a rich history of artists coping with trauma through image making, including artists Frida Kahlo (1907-1954) and Hannah Wilke (1940-1993), who dealt with their personal experience of disease in their artwork. “Creating a Personal Healing Image” employs this tradition to explore how images and imagemaking can create cathartic moments when experiencing illness.

Artist Bio: 

Maria DiFranco’s artworks constitute a social aspect which greatly inform her private studio practice. DiFranco interprets and responds to the results of her research, creating installations, performances, and participatory projects that draw attention to contemporary stories that are unheard, and the relationships that can be forged through the intimate and personal activity of sharing a story from one’s life. DiFranco’s artwork has been exhibited throughout the United States including Purdue University in Indiana, the New Bedford Art Museum in Massachusetts, Red Line Gallery in Colorado, The H Gallery in California, Providence Art Club in Rhode Island, and The University of Akron in Ohio among others

Please send any inquires to Maria DiFranco 

(email) maria.k.difranco@gmail.com 

(website) www.mariadifranco.com

en by EVALS

"The music/composition is intended to be the 'setting' for movement/dance art as well as live painting.  

Our first show ( |untitled| ) featured movement artist Sara Bartley, live painting by Nikki (Kova), and performance art by Kate Weigel [performed July & August at Global Gallery, Wild Goose & Tree Bar]"

Website: https://evalstheatricaldarkwave.wordpress.com/

Music for 'en' >> https://soundcloud.com/user-689307760/en-1

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This Weeks Rip:

DANA

Demon Dawg, from the 2017 album DANA

Avez Vous Du Feu, by Paul Kinsman

Short description (the piece): A brief meditation on being away.

Short description (the writer): Paul Kinsman is a writer and photographer based in Columbus, Ohio. He is currently at work on his first collection of stories and a novel.

Psychic Garden, by Kyle Knapp

          36" x 36"
                            Acrylic on Canvas
               2016

About the Artist:

"Hi, I'm Kyle Knapp.

I am an artist, designer, and illustrator who lives in wonderful Columbus, Ohio. 

I am always looking for new creative challenges and enjoy working in a variety of traditional and digital media. Projects I have worked on in the past include music videos for bands, logos for local businesses, illustrations, murals, and lots of stuff in between.

If you have an interesting project and would like to work together, please contact me at kknappdesign@gmail.com."

Website: http://www.kyle-knapp.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/bummervacation/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/bummervacation

Tumblr: https://bummervacation.tumblr.com/

kinda blue, by Danny Turek

Artist Statement:

"a lot of my writing research goes no further than (goes just far enough as(?)) wikipedia. such are our habits. people have had worse access to worse information. On another note, i can't play any instrument nor can i compose music which has always stuck in my craw so i thought why not cover miles davis (no lyrics, experimental/accessible/beautiful/complex music, this concept of “blue”) with the tools i do have (words, my feelings/thoughts, a working macbook). i’ve been playing around with the computer as an instrument of my art (what it is capable of (poetically)). it's a low res, ugly sort of art, but its so very much the only way anybody writes now (blogs, facebook posts, the new york times). its a weird sort of conversation to have with an artist (especially one so gloriously talented (so beyond-obviously more talented than myself (almost to the point of it being objectively provable))). he makes noise and i translate it into the math of my own language (experience--side note: i recently relocated (<----much more dramatic choice than “moved to . . . from”) to chicago from my hometown of 17 yearsish, columbus, oh). i don’t pretend to know exactly what miles was/is saying, but i dont pretend to know what i'm saying (exactly). i just listened and wrote and played along."

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Excerpt from "Orange Slice Smile", by Michaela Nardo
Originally published by Harness Magazine

1999
The year we met
And on your birthday, you, her, and I gathered on a playground by the lake and our moms dressed us in printed bathings suits and we swam and listened to boy bands and sipped Hi-C orange and it was happiness and sunshine our small hearts couldn’t rationalize–those years of cheap presents and new friends coloring cheeks pink and making smiles wide

2008
The year a boy broke us up
When all we wanted was his braces connecting to our braces in a metal death-match–winner take most embarrassing kiss story and a new beau to high school

And on your birthday, I told you I’d buy you a skate board so we could flirt with him and them (they had long, shaggy hair and crooked noses)

By the end of the summer–when sunshine was locked out of a new school building and all we had left of the warm were bruises and memories of stolen moments with floppy-haired, raven-eyed boys–we found it was still our long talks and sleepovers spent drinking Hi-C orange that made our smiles wide.

Instead of fighting over who would take him to a dance (it was always a giggly death-match) we went to dances together. And we sang to new boy bands with older lead singers who played guitar solos instead of busting out dance moves; our smiles wide and fights forgotten.

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