ARTOMA
We are thrilled to announce that our next exhibition at The Empty Corner will be the powerful “Artoma: Metastasis; The Art of Cancer.” Join us on Friday, February 3 at 6pm for an artist's talk followed by an opening reception at 7pm. This group exhibition features five local artists (Jeri Davis, Michael Gallagher, Eileen Powers, Nancy VanKanegan & Richard Zeid) who have experienced various cancers and created impactful drawings, paintings, photographs and sculptures as a way of processing their experiences with the disease.
Diagnosis of cancer is always a shock. Cancer can have devastating physical and emotional consequences that change one’s actions and attitudes forever. The artists in this exhibition have regarded cancer as an inevitable part of their lives’ paths and allowed their cancer and treatment to guide their art. Using ancient and modern techniques and materials each artist offers their very personal interpretation and reaction to their experience. This aesthetic and emotional processing not only helps each artist to understand their situation and path but through viewing of the artwork others may find a way to accept and understand the journey.
This is the third showing of “Artoma” in a new creative space, titled “Mestastasis” as a reference to cancer’s spread. Thanks to the generosity of the Northwest Community Hospital Foundation these artists are sharing their very personal journeys through their art. Public events will take place throughout the run of the exhibition to offer support and encouragement to those in the community who have been impacted by cancer.
“This (Artoma) was a substantive exhibition that, in spite of its serious initial content, turned out to be uplifting because of the artistic and educational skill of these artists. It shows that even when art is used as a therapeutic tool, it can also embrace serious aesthetic goals and speak to us about the larger issues of life. ”
ARTOMA
Art is a diverse range of human activities in creating visual, auditory or performing artifacts (artworks), expressing the author’s imaginative, conceptual ideas, or technical skill, intended to be appreciated for their beauty or emotional power (Oxford Dictionaries). The most common type of cancer in humans is carcinoma. Carcinoma is a cancer that begins in tissue that lines the inner or outer surfaces of the body. (https://www.healio.com/hematology-oncology/)
Diagnosis of cancer is a always a shock. While cancer is becoming a disease of the modern world, it can have devastating physical and emotional consequences that change one’s actions and attitudes forever. The artists in this exhibition have regarded cancer as an inevitable part of life’s path and allowed their cancer and treatment to guide their art. Using ancient and modern techniques and materials each artist offers their very personal interpretation and reaction to their experience. This aesthetic and emotional processing not only helps each artist to understand their situation and path but through viewing of the works others may find a way to accept and understand the journey themselves and those they love.
The first mounting of Artoma: The Art of Cancer was January 2020 at The Chicago Art Department, Chicago, IL. Five artists of varying media and cancers were a part of this first show.
But, just as cancer often comes back or recurs, a second mounting of the show took place October 2021 at The Greenleaf Art Center, Chicago, IL. We called the show Artoma: Recurrence. This remounting continued with five artists (three from the original show, some with new work, and two new artists)again of varied media and cancers.
Our latest mounting of the show is called Artoma: Mestastasis, because like cancer often does, we are spreading into new spaces to share the work. Four of the original artists, some with new work, and one new artist all sharing their very personal journeys through their art.
Jeri Davis
Interdisciplinary artist/author
Wheaton, IL
Jeri Davis’ rapid-fire cancer experience began in September 2020. Eight days after emergency hospitalization, she went home with a diagnosis of Stage 2 Diffuse Large B-Cell nonHodgkin lymphoma, 1 round of emergency chemo under her belt, a good prognosis, and enough topical humor to fill a coloring book about cancer.
Jeri is a former advertising executive at Chicago agency DDB, and current development director for Naperville Art League. She grew up in Chicago’s Rogers Park neighborhood, and her dad’s sense of humor was a major presence throughout. She saw how humor could distract and flip the switch on a situation, never knowing how well that would pay off with advertising, or cancer, or life.
So to derail dark thoughts, sharing humor was the go-to. Laughter at the oncology nurses station combined with her oncologist and chemo nurse’s encouragement, found her writing down comments, many illustrative. A call between artist friends galvanized the idea for a coloring book, social media helped assemble artists and in 2 months, it was finished.
Greetings from Chemo Country is used by Northwestern University Health System and children’s charity Campout from Cancer, and by many others that have walked with the beast. Davis was overwhelmed by the response she received from the artists, who sent black-and-white drawings that were inspired by her words. Within two months, she had 24 drawings that were ready to be published.
Michael F. Gallagher
Interdisciplinary Artists/Educator
Chicago, IL
Michael F Gallagher is a re-emerging artist and bilingual educator living in Chicago. He moved from Columbus, Ohio where he studied Art and Art History, applying them to his work in performance and installation. Columbia College offered a degree in Interdisciplinary Arts Education which allowed him to pursue work without the boundaries of a single medium, which he continues today.
Michael’s journey through a diagnosis of prostate cancer at an early age included having to navigate a healthcare system that that rarely seems to put the patient first. Much of the emotional ramifications had to be put on a back burner to research health insurance, in and out of network providers, deductibles, and the diagnosis itself.
The prostate is routinely described as a “gland the size of a walnut” and the process of making walnuts transformed from therapy for profound sadness into symbols of resounding triumph. 52 walnuts represent the age at time of diagnosis and the number of weeks that cancer dominated his mindset, which it no longer does.
Eileen Powers
Photographer
Yarmouth Port, MA
“Can You Make Hair For Me?”
In September 2018 Eileen was diagnosed with cancer, specifically lymphoma. The ensuing months held fear, constant pain, misdirection and finally a solution. She is very grateful to all that helped her during this strange and yet oddly positive time. Eventually she lost all of her hair (and some of her eyebrows) during chemotherapy and found she had lost her sense of self; her physical identity was missing. With that experience in mind she wanted to create positive imagery out of being hairless.
The goal of Can You Make Hair for Me is twofold: to show that loss is real, but our ingenuity in dealing with loss (in this case of identity) is what makes us stronger, more compassionate humans; and to give up the artist’s control over the creative process and actively collaborate with others mimicking the chemotherapy process where patients give over their minds and body over to a team of others. After undergoing many treatments she felt compelled to create something joyful out the the experience of being hairless. The activity of making hair created a bridge of conversation and creativity between healthy individuals the artist making it easier to communicate with those eager to help. All are invited to participate in the project by making hair in real time or digitally.
Nancy VanKanegan
Artist/Educator/Yogi
Chicago, IL
These porcelain works are active meditations of my own body viewed through modern scientific imaging. Meditation on the biological interior of the body is, for me, parallel to the metaphysical exploration of the subtle body (layers of awareness or koshas) through meditation.
The violence of surgery, chemotherapy and radiation to remove and control unwanted growth (aka Cancer) seems absolutely counter to nurturing and creation- life itself, but I’ve come to see my breast cancer treatment as a ‘gardening and pruning’ of the physical self through the ‘miracles’ of science.
Exploring color and shape and active layering of clay these narrative porcelain “plates” reference scans of my tumor and lymph nodes.
Richard Zeid
Designer/Educator/Ceramicist
Evanston, IL
Richard Zeid is a designer/educator/ceramicist. As a designer, his personal practice design consultancy, serves a wide range of clients from not-for-profit theatre companies to Fortune 500 corporations. As an educator, he has taught at Columbia College Chicago for nearly 20 years in the advertising art direction and graphic design programs in the Design Department.
Richard has always been drawn to circles, and wheel thrown ceramics is all about the circle, the continuum, perfection of form, and all its abstract meanings. Behind the potter’s wheel, he strives for that elusive perfection. He is also drawn to working in a medium that is fluid, and clay is fluid, a thick viscous fluid, but fluid.
This body of work is very personal for him. The pieces were thrown when Richard escaped the reality of his cancer and spent time away from it all in the studio. The hair used in the firing of these pieces is his hair lost during his six rounds of chemotherapy. He is in every piece of this collection… literally
