Stand Up To Cancer

Illness illuminates the limitations of our physical existence and highlights the patient's social and emotional isolation. Because I'm an artist, my state of mind is visible in my work. I had already begun to find ways to slip from the constraints of self-limiting conventions when I was diagnosed with breast and lung cancer last year. (I have never smoked.) Just months before my illness, I let myself increasingly give into the pull of seemingly irrational, previously unavailable choices. Good thing. I learned it's a fearlessly subjective experience and it's better to be open to the unexpected. "Sharpshooter," a painting I finished before I had cancer embodies the open vista that was starting to appear in my work. After my surgery and treatment, I painted "Moon Water," which reflects the introspective territory I'd just crossed. This more recent work is included in an exhibition at Fordham University, "The Art of Captivity," opening Tuesday, October 5th, 2010.

-- Anne Sherwood Pundyk, Artist

Anne Sherwood Pundyk resides in New York City and has recently shown at Susan Eley Fine Art, Exit Art and the Philoctetes Center, NY, at Art Miami and at Washington & Lee University, Lexington, VA. Pundyk is also a freelance art writer who has contributed to The Brooklyn Rail and maintains a blog about contemporary art.