Art Exhibition
Curatorial Statement
This year‘s exhibition weaves together the diverse experiences of individuals impacted by breast cancer and it reflects the far reaching impact of the disease. Each voice underscores the importance of advancing our understanding of this disease—from its causes and prevention to effective and accessible treatments. Works range from the political to the personal, from the celebration of life to the processing of profound loss. Some of the participants are seasoned, award-winning artists while others have newly discovered the transformative power of art, employing it as a vehicle for healing and growth. Each unique perspective embodies extraordinary vision and courage. These individuals represent a much larger chorus of voices, and by bringing them to the forefront of the symposium, we bring into focus the reason behind our commitment to finding better ways to prevent, treat, and cure breast cancer.
—Catherine Saiki
Artist Biographies
Sarah Barsness
Sarah Barsness was born and raised in the American West. She currently lives, teaches, and makes art in San Francisco. Barsness is currently an Affiliate Artist at the Headlands Center for the Arts in Marin County. She is a former Artist in Residence at Recology – the San Francisco “dump”. Recent past exhibits include Materiality at Yorkarts, in York, PA; Cardiovascular, at UNAM, Cuernavaca, Mexico; a collaborative exhibition with Veronica Sahagun, I Know How You Feel, at the Santa Fe Contemporary Art Center, Santa Fe, NM; Gen Art‘s Emerge! in
San Francisco; Cream from the Top, in Benicia, CA; and Close Calls at The Headlands Center for the Arts.
“In Medusozoa, jellyfish are stand-ins for the cancer cells that form breast cancer tumors; they also serve as metaphors for breasts removed during mastectomies. Jellyfish are strange creatures: Despite the fact that they actually have no brain, they are able to move through the sea, nourish themselves, and reproduce. They are soulless, often dangerous, but also elegant, ethereal.”
Joanne Beaule Ruggles
Joanne Ruggles was diagnosed with breast cancer on February 27, 2004. Having lost her sister at the age of 35 to the disease, she was consumed with fear. Throughout her chemotherapy treatments and surgeries, she painted, finding emotional relief and a physical respite in the act of painting. She tackled questions surrounding her diagnosis: “Why did this terrible event happen to me? How could I survive it? What kind of creator would let this occur?” Finding the answers was not her goal, but exploring the issues in all of their complexity became her focus. Her works move from expressions of rage to resignation; they explore death and express hope for life; they question why and they accept the incomprehensible with faith. Ultimately, they provided her the opportunity
to document her breast cancer journey and to tell her story. Joanne is the recipient of numerous honors, including a grant from the James Irvine Foundation.
“My life‘s creative work has been focused on portraying the human form to explain the human experience. This study is a spiritual endeavor—an act of trust between model and artist. What the artist learns is not simply the anatomical structure of that specific human body, but more importantly, what it is to be human—to be weary, to feel anger, or to yearn for one another. By such study, we know with the greatest of intensity what it is to be human and we possess the ability to tell our own story and to share aspects of the universal human story.”
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Nancy Bellen
Nancy Bellen is from Santa Rosa, California. She worked as a television producer and editor for ten years prior to her diagnosis of breast cancer at the age of 32.
A twelve-year survivor, she now works as a film maker and photographer, and as an advocate for women with cancer. Her passion for the past eleven years has been
to provide access to quality breast care services for women in her community.
Nancy has also been an advocate with The Breast Cancer Fund and climbed Mt. Fuji as part of the Mt. Fuji Climb Against the Odds team. She is one of the artists whose work appears in Art.Rage.Us; Art and Writing by Women with Breast Cancer, which has exhibited internationally.
“When people see my work, I want something in them to open. An opening that feels elemental and familiar. Perhaps in a place that has been long forgotten. A place before thought — maybe in the chest. My companion in this dialogue is Rebecca Wilson. Our lives were irrevocably changed by breast cancer; I was diagnosed when I was 32 and Rebecca lost her mother when she was 17. Through photography, I seek to express fear, loss, surrender and grace. Through landscape we explore coming to wholeness after loss and the resiliency of being human.”
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Lori Benson
Fourteen months after giving birth to her daughter Talula, Lori Benson received life-altering news when her doctor called (after a routine mammogram) to tell her she had breast cancer.
Dear Talula began with a suggestion to start filming from Lori’s husband, a documentary filmmaker, who recognized the compelling subject matter. Within days of her diagnosis, Lori’s friends began videotaping her and the camera soon became an invisible yet pervasive presence in her life. The major moments and tiny details of her experience as a woman, a daughter, a friend, and a new mother going through breast cancer, were all recorded. Mixing verité footage with home movies and family photographs, this 34-minute film is an intimate portrait of a young woman who met the challenges of her breast cancer diagnosis with captivating courage and candor.
The Art of Healing (Denise Dalton and contributing artists)
An emotionally complex illness like breast cancer requires more than science to bring the deeply-felt understanding that is needed for a sustained effort to reduce or eliminate the devastating impact of this disease. Art
helps us understand the experiences of others. In this way, art is the link between science and empathic action.
The artists whose works are in this exhibit accepted an invitation to make sculptures in the form of breast
prostheses. Some of the artists are women who have experienced breast cancer; others have been touched
by the disease in other ways. No matter who they were, the artists took an interest and used the very thing that
conceals the effects of breast cancer and its treatments to reveal things that can guide our collective response to this complex disease.
Art and design pick up where science leaves off and delivers knowledge directly to our hearts. The Art of Healing Breast Cancer: A Union of Science and Design shows us what a mastectomy can be like when the veils of shame and fear are pulled aside. We are shown how to look at breasts and their absence with a new kind of interest, without fear or pity. We are given an opportunity to look at the devastation of breast cancer and mastectomy straight on and we are offered the inspiring knowledge that a woman who has lost a breast to breast cancer is likely to feel that she is more of a woman afterwards, not less.
Denise Dalton co-curated the first exhibition of the Breast Art collection in 1997 in order to offer routes of expression for women who have had mastectomies. “After fifteen years of wearing a prosthesis, I realized I wanted to wear something that would be more expressive of the many ways I feel and that would convey this message: It‘s okay to look; this is not shaming; this is me and I am more than a body. I am spirit and this art celebrates my spirit. It is as unique as I am unique. Art is my catalyst for change—a reminder that I have choices and that my ‘completeness‘ comes in many forms.”
Renata Cuellar
Renata Cuellar‘s mother, Ana Pena, was diagnosed with breast cancer. An avid art student, she created this
painting as a tribute to her mother as well as to all of those touched by the disease. “I made this painting to
emphasize the importance of breast cancer awareness. My intention was to combine visual and verbal communication
forms that harmoniously work together to express one message. The two circles represent a Venn
diagram unified by a pink, multicolored breast cancer awareness ribbon. The black and white circles represent a
life: lost, born, or living. The mission of finding light within darkness has been my objective. Searching for hope
presents possibilities, those seen and unseen. I hope this encourages women to be checked regularly for breast
cancer. Moreover, this painting was created to support those individuals who have been impacted by breast
cancer. You are not alone. A difficult situation can be approached with optimism, life, hope and unity.”
Jeanne Giles
The Circle Project was created to bring awareness to issues particular to young women diagnosed with breast cancer. To that end, Jeanne‘s project brings the viewer‘s attention to all of the people in a young breast cancer patient‘s life—the constellation of those around her who are deeply affected by the diagnosis. Among the many
issues confronting young women with this diagnosis is the possibility of infertility that can accompany treatment
options—alternately, she may be facing this diagnosis with young children to consider. Jeanne underwent surgery, chemotherapy, and radiation treatments for breast cancer at the age of 37. “How many lives does a breast
cancer diagnosis touch? It touches the circle of all the people a woman loves. Look around this circle. Do you
see yourself?”
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Torrie Groening
Torrie Groening has exhibited her work in group and solo shows
in Canada and the US. Her work is in several public gallery and
museum collections. She has served in a variety of roles as a
teacher, master printer, collector, and gallery owner.
“This Elixir, It Won’t Fix Her began to take shape as I started to notice—and then created a game of—finding the most offensive or ridiculous pink-ribboned object on offer. At first it was kind of funny, then I just wanted it to end.
This is a personal response to becoming another target of the huge, relentless marketing campaign that is breast cancer. Instead of being comforted or inspired, I felt constantly bombarded and taunted with reminders of cancer in the form of pink ribbons. For me, the pink ribbons were like tumors that showed up on my family’s food products and domestic basics.
There is a point in which the pink ribbon industry targets women, and men, on a fundamental level: fear and guilt. Could these pink blessed objects, from sparkly key chains to cars, be purchased for insurance against cancer or to ease the ‘survivor guilt‘ of friends and family who are, so far, the lucky ones?
In this contemporary, vanitas still life, the frailty of life is seen not by the erosion of the natural objects or by including traditional symbols of death; life (and contemplation of death) is made fleeting by a casual consumer response to one‘s predicament. Instead of crying in the frozen food section when my son’s favorite fruit pops were pink-ribboned, I tried to keep a sense of humor. You would have laughed too at the Castro grocery when I heard someone ask if the nipple clips (pink ribbon Chip-Clips) came in any other color… Nope! They only come in tumor-pink!”
Eleanor Hughes
“I made this collage, I am Strong sometime after my surgery for breast cancer in 2003. I needed to make a bold
visual statement for myself. I needed to counteract the apprehension I had been feeling since my diagnosis. I
visualized my white blood cells as ravenous white dogs gobbling up cancer cells that might be anywhere in my
body. ‘I am healthy, I am strong, I am well’ became a mantra for me during that time. I was learning to practice meditation, changing my diet and some other aspects of my life as well. I also wanted to call on all the positive
forces in the universe to speed up my recovery with healing energy and light. I feel that making this collage, living
with it, seeing it every day did make me stronger.”
Katherine Klein
“My mother was diagnosed with breast cancer in 1978, and was treated for three more cancers before she
passed away from lung cancer in 1994. During that time she told me that she never thought about dying from
cancer and in the end, she said she was just too tired for another treatment. My paintings are a tribute to her
memory. Cold Morning Creek was painted during the time of my mother‘s treatment. The Walk We Took After
the Funeral was a gathering of my family to a place that my mother loved. It was bitter cold as we wandered
down the creek, thinking of her and each other. The images of this walk stayed with me and a few years later
I began the paintings. I painted all of us walking in the winter landscape, but couldn‘t find the right way to put
in my mother. This painting remained unfinished until, on a trip to Europe, I visited Notre Dame in Paris. Over
the doorway of the cathedral was a relief that depicted the death of an important person, with people crowded
around in a small room. This was how I finished the painting.”
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Liesa Lietzke
Liesa Lietzke earned her MFA in sculpture at California College of the Arts in 2009. In her sculptural practice,
she creates troubled fetishes, complicating bodily
perceptions and flirting with appeal and aversion. As a
performer, she creates sculptural costumes and inhabits
them in offstage settings. The performances play in
the space between preciousness and disturbance; they
also struggle with a longing for union and a grieving of
irrevocable divisions.
“While one installation is site-specific to this symposium, Polypolis and Stuffagus and Pillow were made in the year before my breast cancer diagnosis. The latter were not explicitly about breast cancer at the time they were made, but instead revealed a prescience operating through my art practice. My sculptural work invades the installation space as bulbous, many-limbed and multi-textured forms, from tiny to larger-than-life, made from discarded/second-hand clothing as well as fabricated materials. They burst through walls; they hang in mid-air. They playfully invite a viewer’s touch while simultaneously threatening to overwhelm. Pink and sweetly soft forms contain rotted areas of simulated flesh: these ‘skin’ areas are made of poured pinkish latex embedded with hair and with small red candies which melt and drip as the latex dries.
The way my themes are translated into impact on the viewer is the driving force behind my formal choices. The work seeks to complicate the self-sense (or proprioceptive awareness) of the viewer’s own body. It exposes the tensions and fragilities of the boundaries that separate the self and other, the clean and foul, the interior and exterior. It engages with the sweetened artifice and compulsively cleaned- up cultural overlays that wrap the rebellious and sometimes grotesque flesh. The flesh resists, becoming biomorphic part-objects that grow, multiply, and creep back through the crevices of the clean and precious.”
Laura McHugh
“On the Table represents my emotional response to a series of treatments for breast cancer: needle biopsy,
tissue biopsy, a full mastectomy of my left breast, four intense chemotherapy treatments and radiation. This all
transpired within five months of my initial mammogram and diagnosis at the age of 37. I was recently separated
from my husband after 14 years of marriage and had just weaned the youngest of my four children from breast
feeding. The radiation treatments were so easy compared to everything else I’d been through, but also very
hard emotionally. I would start to cry every morning in the middle of the short treatment. I was cold and all alone
on the table in the dark room under the loud whirling and clicking machine. I was grateful to be healing, but also
terrified to be nearing the end of treatments with nothing more to distract me from having to confront my disease.
The five “tattooed‘ eyes are where the india ink marks were placed on my chest by the technician in an attempt to reduce radiation exposure to my heart and lungs. The circles and squares represent the light and alignment marks I could see above me on the machine. The tear represents my acceptance, finally, which led to my mental and physical recovery that is now a durable 14 year remission.”
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Hratch Nargizian
Hratch Nargizian is a fifth generation metal-smith, born in
Armenia. He initially learned the craft from his family and
continued his education at Art and Craft school of Yerevan.
He apprenticed with Master Garobet and Valodia and committed
years of practice to honing his skills. Today he works
out of his studio in downtown San Francisco. His work has
been exhibited nationally and internationally.
“Plants can heal; plants can kill. They feed and clothe us, enable us think in new ways, let us forget... Many medications we use today come from their extracts or derivatives. One such drug,Taxol—a cytotoxin—was originally extracted from the bark and needles of the Yew tree. Taxanes are used today in combination with other chemotherapies to treat breast cancer.
Nothing could have prepared me for sister‘s breast cancer
diagnosis. Witnessing her willingness to undergo chemotherapy
treatments, including Taxane—essentially poisoning her
entire body in an effort to kill cancer cells—made me think of
the metamorphosis she was undergoing. I began working on
Vespertine as a gift to honor her and her journey. I envisioned
a beautiful spirit emerging from a pod full of thorns
and claws. Vespertine is a flower that blooms and releases its fragrance at night; despite the darkness, its
delicate blossom unfolds, transforming the night air around it. The spiked pod is from the Datura plant, a genus
of the species Vespertine. The pod was cast in silver. The dancing spirit is made of the petals and stamen of a
lemon bud, which are cast in gold.”
Leila Noorani
“Printmaking has traditionally been used as a method of creating multiple copies of one image using a single
plate. In this series, I use a copper plate to create a sequence of one-of-a-kind prints, each evolution informing
the next. In Quandry, I drew upon the parallels of this technique and the journey one undergoes during breast
cancer treatment. A scarring of the plate begins the story, traditionally called ‘dry-point’, where I draw onto the
plate using using a sharp tool. In this case, the countours of a woman‘s head emerged, body exposed, eyes
shut. By erasing some of the lines and reworking others, I continue to work into the plate until I am satisfied and
ready to pull the second print—which contains traces of the first and new marks unique to the second. In the
third and final cell, a complete transformation occurs—where shoulders once were, a sitting figure, adorned with
antlers emerges. A warrior or medicine woman has taken her place, bestowed with wisdom delivered through
trial.”
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Nancy Otto
“Pink Gas was created for the Think Before You Pink exhibition benefiting Breast Cancer Action (BCA).
BCA‘s Think Before You Pink Campaign was launched
in 2002 in response to the growing concern about the
overwhelming number of pink ribbon products and
promotions on the market sold to advance the breast
cancer cause. The campaign calls for more transparency
and accountability by companies that take part in
breast cancer fundraising, and encourages consumers
to ask critical questions about pink ribbon promotions.
The list of pink ribbon products grows every
year. From candy to clothing to automobiles, thousands
of companies are pinning pink ribbons on their
products in an attempt to boost their image and their
profits by connecting themselves to a good cause.”
Nancy Otto is a sculptor working primarily in glass. She has exhibited nationally in New York at The Judson Church and E3 Galleries, Chicago at Woman Made Gallery, Pittsburgh at Morgan Contemporary Glass Gallery, and at the San Francisco International Airport Museum and Micaela Gallery. Nancy studied at Pilchuck Glass School with Karen Willenbrink, The Studio at Corning with Martin Rosol and Jiri Harcuba, and Haystack Mountain School of Crafts with Nancy Callan and Katherine Gray. Her work has been featured in Curve Magazine, the Best of America Glass Artists and Artisans, and the San Francisco Chronicle Magazine.
Ana Milena Pena
“The first question that arose after being diagnosed with breast cancer was: ‘how much time do I have to live?’ I underwent treatment, including a radical mastectomy and chemotherapy. Losing my breast and my hair was
very difficult and I struggled with definitions of womanhood and femininity.
I used painting as a means to come to terms with the mastectomy. During this process a geisha subconsciously found her way into my work. Losing my breast made me feel as if I was void of any sexual appeal, even to my husband at the time. After noticing the first Geisha in my painting, I noticed another one. The second Geisha seemed to be walking towards my face, gracefully bending her right knee in approval. Geishas are immortal; life goes on and every human form is beautiful.”
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Joyce Radtke
“My work as an artist is ever-evolving and often addresses
issues of transformation as well as the blending
of the spirit and physical worlds. After I was diagnosed
with breast cancer, I became fascinated by the story of
Persephone, the Greek goddess of eternal spring, of
innocence. Abducted into the Underworld, Persephone
ate the seeds of the pomegranate, the symbol of fruition
and creativity. Eventually she was released, innocent no
longer.
I imagine that she felt she had a new chance to find her life again, to embrace the light. Like Persephone, I journeyed into the dark realms and used the seeds of creativity to find my way home. By imagining myself as the goddess of eternal spring, I was able to escape from the pain, the grieving, the dark and barren landscape that the doctors painted for me. Again, after this third time, I will return to the light, to living moments as they come. Diving into healing art and writing, I envision a voice of hopefulness in the face of fear and embrace life in the face of it being taken away.”
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Melissa Rankin
“The Woman Inside Project was born when, in my work as
an OB/GYN physician, I had to tell a woman who was pregnant
that her biopsy was positive for breast cancer. Inspired
to help her memorialize a moment in time—before she gave
birth, lost her breasts and everything changed—I offered to
cast her torso in plaster. The seed of an idea gestated, and
five years and multiple plaster casts later, this exhibition
emerged as a way to honor the beauty within each woman,
particularly those with breast cancer.
After completing the cast, I hold up the sculpture and say, ‘So this is what world sees. Now tell me about the rest of you.’ I then listen for as long as it takes for her to unveil the breathtaking woman inside. I transcribe her story into a first person narrative of the beauty that I see within her.
Some of the women I sculpted describe the process as a spiritual healing of sorts, during which I touch their bodies, place bandages over their wounds, then remove the bandages, leaving them feeling whole. For others, the process is traumatic, dredging up painful memories of surgical bandages and scars. Either way, the experiences are authentic and I feel blessed to have been there, holding hands, holding space.
While traumas such as breast cancer crack us open and force us to grow, we all experience painful wounds that threaten to unravel us. It‘s how we respond to our wounds that tests us and gives us the opportunity to blossom. The women who participated in this project have created a garden for which I can claim no credit. It has been an honor to be their witness.”
Dr. Rankin is practicing gynecologist, a nationally-represented artist, teacher, mother and author of the forthcoming book, What’s Up Down There? Questions You’d Only Ask Your Gynecologist If She Was Your Best Friend. She is also the creator of the successful health and wellness blog OwningPink.com and the founder of the Owning Pink Center, an integrative medicine center in Mill Valley aimed at helping women achieve vital wellness.
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Trix Rosen
“In 1998, Takami Yao had undergone a double mastectomy.
She told me that she had been scared when diagnosed with
breast cancer, assuming that she would die. Following the
chemotherapy, when her hair was falling out, she made a
decision to shave her head. When she looked in the mirror,
she realized that she was more beautiful than she had ever
been. She saw herself reborn, and knew at that moment
that she was going to live.
As a photographer, I saw both Takami‘s scars and her beauty. I dared to look deeper because she wasn‘t afraid to show me. How optimistic and courageous to look inward, to face loss, and become stronger through the experience. The landscape of our body is forever changing. Like a topographic map, the lines and shadings reflect our physical and psychological journey through life – through adolescence, childbirth, illness, menopause, and old age. My photographs show that it is possible to face these transfiguring changes, however painful and frightening, and yet still create new beginnings.
Takami‘s photographs depict a woman who bravely explores the physical and emotional contours of her new form. These portraits can be viewed as a narrative about her life and also as a defining moment of change. Bald, breast-less and scarred, she is as she appears to be–fearless and beautiful, essentially and eternally female.”
Anne Spooner
“Years ago, one of my older brothers found a nest of abandoned baby birds and brought them home. Our mother
tended to the orphaned birds on our screened-in porch that summer. When September came around and the
birds were old enough to make it on their own, my mom decided to let them go. Not too long after she set them
free, she was in the backyard and one of the birds flew down from a tree and landed on her shoulder. It was as
if the bird was saying, ‘I remember you‘.
I had been working with bird forms in my art for several years before I was diagnosed with breast cancer late in 2007. The birds took on a much deeper meaning. A True Story touches on the baby bird story of long ago,
portraying a message that birds symbolize hope, protection, compassion and healing. Even though a cancer
diagnosis lands you in a dark place, there is light ahead. Just like those resilient little birds, I know my spirit is
strong, too.”
The Art for Recovery Breast Cancer Quilts Project & UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center
The Breast Cancer Quilts Project gives voice to women coping with breast cancer by inviting them, their families
and friends to create quilt squares using images that express their personal experience with illness. These
women come from across the United States and from underserved communities throughout the Bay Area,
including women coping with breast cancer who are incarcerated.
The squares are assembled into full-sized quilts that tell a collective story of the inner realities of the illness experience. There are now almost 70 quilts in the collection; they travel around the country for exhibition and hang in rotating displays in the public areas of various locations on the UCSF Medical Center Campus. If you are interested in making a quilt square, please visit the Art for Recovery website at http://cancer.ucsf.edu/afr for instructions.
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Zero Breast Cancer & The Plexus Art Group
“I was only 47 when I first found a tumor. Two weeks after surgery and one day before chemotherapy, I married
my soul mate, Bill Mentzer. In 1996, I helped to form the group that is now Zero Breast Cancer. Eleven
years after my breast cancer diagnosis the tumor returned and required a second round of surgery,
chemotherapy, and radiation. That gave me six more years of a wonderful life. Now I am living today with
another recurrence—metastatic breast disease. When my dear friends and fellow artists in the Plexus Art
Group asked me, ‘what can we do to support you?’ my answer was quick: ‘I‘m going to lose my hair again
when the chemotherapy starts. Let‘s create comfortable hats (not wigs) that are works of art. Let‘s show
the world beauty!’
The Plexus Art Group responded with enthusiasm, generosity, and their usual creativity, and I was gifted with several lovingly made hats to wear when I lost my hair to chemotherapy. This helped enormously to improve my sense of strength, femininity and confidence. Beyond that, and in keeping with our Plexus mission, we decided to create and exhibit one-of-akind hats that we could use to raise money for Zero Breast Cancer” –Roni Peskin Mentzer
Zero Breast Cancer is a nonprofit organization dedicated to finding the causes of breast cancer through community participation in the research process. They focus on identifying environmental factors and the role they play in the development of breast cancer at all stages of life.
