PROJECT ART HEALS presents Rise Up (2022)
What?
Rise Up is a COVID-19 multimedia ART MEMORIAL and TRIBUTE. It is interactive, collaborative, communal, and sustainable.
Rise Up is a 5-foot-by-5-foot mosaic art piece that is comprised of 3 brightly-colored human figures that are joyously jumping. The figures are made up of the small mementos donated by the public to commemorate their pandemic losses and journeys, as well as countless pieces of clean healthcare waste. The figures are “held in space” by thousands of empty COVID-19 vaccine vials, much like the COVID-19 vaccine supported us in moving beyond the darkest times of the pandemic.
Even if you did not donate a memento, collect healthcare waste, or receive a vaccine dose from the specific vials used in the art piece, anyone can consider themselves a part of this art project simply by having lived through the COVID-19 pandemic. This art project is for everyone, near and far. It is by the community and for the community.
In the words of Andra Day’s song Rise Up:
All we need is hope
And for that we have each other
Why?
The COVID-19 global pandemic reached just about every corner on Earth. It has affected most everyone in one way or another. There are likely few exceptions to that. The AIDS Memorial Quilt was conceived and created during the early stages of the AIDS pandemic in the 1980s, but there has not been a collaborative, community memorial for the COVID-19 pandemic. Project Art Heals hopes to help fill that void.
We all saw the time graphs of the different COVID-19 surges. Nowhere in those timelines was there time to collectively pause to reflect on our experiences, to mourn our losses, or to celebrate the obstacles we have overcome. Funerals never got scheduled. Milestones were not celebrated. Simple family and friend gatherings did not happen. We have lost so many healthcare workers due to burn out and a general feeling of moral injury. Healthcare still has not recovered from the wounds and scars created by the pandemic.
The aim of Project Art Heals is to create space to honor our communities, patients, health care workers, science, and humanity. Rise Up celebrates our resiliency while paying tribute to our individual and shared pandemic traumas.
How?
Whether you are physically standing in front of the mosaic in the University of Utah Hospital lobby (view hospital map) or viewing it online via the interactive high-resolution maps, the hope is that Rise Up creates the space for people to pause, reflect, acknowledge, mourn, and heal. You can read the courageous, touching, and sometimes funny stories behind the donated physical mementos.
While physical and virtual memento collection is now closed, the website remains open to share your comments about the project and art piece.
There is no hierarchy of grief or experiences related to the COVID-19 pandemic. If you feel it, then it is real. We invite anyone with whom this resonates to share your thoughts on the Project Art Heals webpage.
Who?
Rise Up is a collaboration between physician Emily Hagn, MD, artist Heidi Calega, the Eccles Health Sciences Library, University of Utah Health, the Salt Lake County Health Department, healthcare workers, patients, family, friends, neighbors, strangers, and the greater public population. This project creation was made possible by a grant from the University of Utah Sustainable Campus Initiative Fund.
Where?
Right now, you can find Rise Up at the bottom of the escalators on level A in the University of Utah Hospital (view hospital map) in Salt Lake City, UT.
Or, virtually explore and zoom into Rise Up right here on the website in dazzling high-resolution form.
What’s Next?
Do you have a idea for a permanent home in a public space for Rise Up? If so, contact us at: art.heals.ut@lists.utah.edu
