Journey into the landscapes of the heart

Louise Bodenheimer did not begin creating the drawings in her new exhibit "Guardians, Mothers and Birth of a Woman," for public consumption. They began as simple line drawings that expressed thoughts and feelings she was having during a painful passage in her life, a coming to terms with her own womanhood.

"This was how I was able to make meaning out of this unexpected situation," she says.

Each of the drawings fit on an index card. Then a colleague at Southeast Missouri State University suggested that Bodenheimer put them in a faculty show. "It was very scary at first," she says. "But when I stopped thinking about people looking at them, they were able to come out more clearly."

She enlarged and colored 20 of the original drawings for the show. There are 236 drawings in this exhibition.

Bodenheimer is an associate professor of graphic design/illustration.

The exhibit opens today at Gallery 100 and the Lorimier Gallery at the Arts Council of Southeast Missouri, 30 N. Main St., Cape Girardeau. A reception will be held from 5 to 8 p.m. today.

Also opening today at the arts council is a new exhibit by the Visual Arts Cooperative. Window galleries will feature works by Lou Varro, Matt Miller and Judy Barks-Westrich through Oct. 15.

In her artist's statement, below, Bodenheimer explains how this art was created and how it has helped her heal:

By Louise Bodenheimer

During a trip to Chicago in 1998, I was drawn to the small silver plaque amulet that I found in a shop that sold international artifacts.

When I questioned the shop owner about it, he told me that it was from Rajasthan, India, and that the eight figures that were represented were called the saptamatrkas, or seven mothers and a guardian. He said that the amulet was pinned to the clothing of pregnant women for protection.

This intrigued me, since I had been considering motherhood for some time, even if it meant facing infertility treatment. When I later learned that giving birth to my own child was not meant to be, I wanted to rid myself of the silver pendant. I was not sure what it meant to me anymore, or if it had any relevance whatsoever to my situation.

I had been diagnosed with a condition called polycystic ovarian syndrome, or PCOS, that had progressed to a precancerous stage.

Because of this and other health issues that accompanied this condition, my physician, due to the risks involved for me, did not recommend pregnancy. The unexpected word, hysterectomy, created an about-face for me that was a tough moment to pass through and absorb as reality. Even as my physician spoke as I sat still on the exam table, trying to listen and comprehend her words, I found that I could not hear anymore and the colors of the room slowly faded. I could tell by her own eyes that it was hard for the messenger to give such news. As my husband and I left her office to think this over, I felt his steady and strong hand at my back as I walked in front of him. I did not cry until I got into the car, and closed the door, thinking through my tears that surely this must be a mistake.

I did not discard the silver amulet, following the gentle advice of family and friends. However, I shelved it on a drawing table upstairs in my small studio, with no more thought about it. In the months prior to my surgery, I found myself waking in the wee hours of the morning, unable to return to sleep. To ease my mind from the concerns that haunted me, I would go upstairs to my studio to relax. This was a place where I kept my pearls, secrets, and where I had creative privacy. It was also the one place I felt I could get up and away from the earth and look outside the window, down upon my world that had gone awry.

On the first night I ventured away from my bed to upstairs, I sat down at the drawing table, expecting to doodle or read. I saw the amulet resting right where I had left it. It made me sad to look at it and think about why I ever thought it would be anything special. The silvered figures of mothers standing solidly together with the guardian strengthened me somehow. I reached for a nearby index card, and began to draw the shape of the pendant. Images that symbolized thoughts and feelings that I could not verbally articulate were drawn in simple lines inside the five-sided frame. A space around the edges of each picture revealed an area in which I began to write concisely and honestly what was bothering me. The fears and lost dreams began to take on physical and visual form. I told myself that they were private and just for me. For my eyes only, more began to emerge.

For a period of time after the surgery, as I physically healed, the drawings kept coming. They came forth with a kind of urgency. Sometimes there were minutes between them. Sometimes there were weeks. Sometimes I could not see them as I cried, but I kept drawing. They helped me gradually face the lack of answers, the confusion and the slowing of time. At the urging of one of my colleagues, Kathy Smith, I reluctantly showed the first 20 at a faculty exhibition. In order to show them, I had the original small drawings photocopied and enlarged onto yellow card stock and then filled with color pencil and silver paint pen. The color silver referred back to the silver of the pendant, enhancing important elements in each image. Viewer response to these drawings was more positive than I had ever expected. I later completed 80 more compositions.

During this period, I began to show some weight loss. I was taking better care of myself. I saw an opportunity to get to a healthier me.

Another series of drawings emerged, examining my perceptions of my body image, for by now I was not afraid to journey into more of the landscapes of my heart. This particular series, now on beige card stock, came slower as I went deeper. I rediscovered very old issues of voice, of self-abandonment, and of the desire to know who was under all of the layers of armor I had protected myself with over the years. I discovered how I had filled some holes that lay within me. I also learned that there are sometimes some plateaus. Several of the drawings and writings even dipped back into unearthed issues of the previous series. I began to have a sense that somewhere underneath, in a kind of slumber, was a beautiful woman of great wisdom, capability and value. I began to know and embrace her, after being away from her for such a long time. Understanding and accepting her humanness, which began to come into view, has been well worth the journey.