“Do you want to come out of your room?” a nurse asked a young boy. “The distraction is here.”
By distraction, she meant the four of us who entered the hospital, bearing drums, guitar, shakers, ukulele, and the bowed psaltery. Could be a cool band name, right? The Distractions, on tour in a healing venue near you!
I may think of myself as a writer, but as an Artist in Residence in Healthcare, I have already been a musician, a visual artist, and a dancer. To say the least. On Monday, I was an alien and on Wednesday, I was a monster. Anything to amuse. How can one prepare for this? For the last two weeks, I have been in an intensive training program, graciously led by artists from the Arts in Medicine program at Shands Hospital and the University of Florida in Gainesville. We painted with water colors, filled mandalas, made crowns from pipe cleaners, danced to tribal beats. If that doesn’t sound intensive, you have to imagine the lectures, filled with heartbreaking stories of patients, family members, medical students, and caregivers who dipped their toes– or whole selves– in the arts while in a hospital bed or waiting room. Did you know that you can dance with your eyes? Do you believe that a pen can heal?
This is the first year that the Center for the Arts will be sending a team of artists to Buffalo hospitals. It seems more than fortuitous that we moved to Buffalo just a few days before the training program began and that I was sent an invitation to apply for the residency back in May. I have been trying to connect arts with medicine since I was told in college that there was no way that I could major in Theatre, Creative Writing, and Biology. Then, my grades in Chemistry proved it. In grad school, I persisted by shadowing cancer researcher, Dr. Fiorenza Ianzini, whose lab I had worked in years before. I wrote the play, Cell Cycle , in honor of her work and staged a reading of it at the University of Iowa Hospital for their program, Project Art. I was touched by the response of doctors and patients, but then I walked out the door to go back to rehearsals. I had no idea that I had crossed paths with a global movement, transforming hospital environments with art. Or that I would find it again.
Though supported with research, the idea that one can heal (see full definition) through art is not everyone’s easy pill to swallow. Some of us have felt this, intuitively, since we were in kindergarten. Others protest that they don’t have a creative bone in their body or think that art is reserved for certain people and not for them. But this is new. For thousands of years, we’ve been dancing out fevers and singing for rain. There’s a proverb from Zimbabwe, “If you can talk, you can sing. If you can walk, you can dance.” I’m also sure that if you can hold a pen, you can draw and if you can tell a story, you can write. And doesn’t that sound like a good distraction?
Dear Cristina,
This is such wonderful news! Congratulations, and you mirror my interests so wonderfully, so double congratulations! Thanks for sharing-Karen
Dear Cristina, How exciting to be able be involved in something like this and what a great name ” Distractions”. You Rock girl!!!!!! I`ve always believed healing comes in many forms for body and soul . We can all use a little “‘distraction” now and then. Can`t wait to hear more…Donna
Dear Princess Pippa Your a pimp in the best sense of the word. Power you and big ups. I liked when you pointed to the relevance of ancient tradition to modern times. We are so snobby with our IPOD Pasta makeing gagetry that we think we are cooler than all past cultures combined. But we have forgot something. May you strap explosive paint tubes to your tummy and color the world with flavorful raindow splashes.
Oh yeah hey speaking of ancient traditions this is a good flic… http://www.moviesfoundonline.com/baraka.php
A sa lama lick um
SO amazing Pippa! Congrats. I can’t wait to hear more.
Cristina,
Love this–that you are helping heal with art. How could people not believe that the two go hand in hand?! I will tell this story over and over again. Keep us posted!
At Olin College, an up and coming engineering school in Needham, Massachusetts, the biology teacher is the art teacher as well and a key part of her course is devoted to finding the creativity in biology. Anyways, this is quite amazing, and best of luck!
Thank you for all the encouragement and interest! I will be sure to share more along the way.
And how fascinating to hear of a Biology/Art professor. The cancer researcher I mentioned is also an artist and photographer. There’s definitely a connection!
Dear Cristina:
It was great to learn “what you’re up to”!!! Surely very exciting & that you’re, what I expect, on the cutting edge of integrating art & cancer. You are truly one talented artist. Love, Aunt Joyce
[...] that only boxes are filled. At least I just learned some new mantras in that artist training that I told you all about. Mantra #1 = Hee heh heh (Laughter) and Mantra #2 = gasp (Amazement). I will drop the [...]
[...] I first wrote about Arts and Healthcare here on Crucial Minutiae, I promised in a comment that I would update all of you. Our band, The Distractions, has broken up [...]
[...] the Children’s Hospital with the Arts in Healthcare program that I’ve mentioned before here. I was looking for someone to work with when I learned that most of the kids on the floor that I [...]
[...] lead guitarist, Stuart Fuchs, is one of the Artists in Residence at the Center for the Arts, so I got a peak at his creative process this summer. I discovered that [...]