Healing the Pain - New Jersey Artist Sees Creating Art As A Way to Heal Our 9/11 Emotional Scars

Roselle Park artist Leona M. Seufert believes that creating art can be the way through which we heal our emotional scars from 9/11. Over the last year, not only has she produced her own art around that topic but has worked with a NYC organization, Art for Healing, helping its director Loren Ellis promote “The Days After...9/11/01 in New York City” a collection of poetry, essays, photographs, and artwork to be published later this year.

Ms Seufert, as an artist living across the Hudson from Ground Zero, is all too familiar with the raw emotions of that day. “When I stood on my street I could see the smoke rising in the distance. It was like hell had broken loose and we all wondered, living so close to Newark International airport, if we would be the next target. I wrote a many poems in the following weeks, trying to quell my anger and fears.”

Over the last 5 years, she continued to write poems and essays around the topic, performed her works, published a book, “The 9/11 Year, poetry and essays written in the year after 9/11” and most recently started a series of computer generated works that combine her photographs with her poetry. “Writing about these events and my feelings, but more importantly, sharing them with others, has been very helpful in moving past the pain.” She hopes her current exhibit of digital prints, now on display through October 5 at the Pearl St Gallery, 633 Pearl St Elizabeth, New Jersey, can similarly help those who view it.

“Creating my own works of art and sharing them is therapeutic, however discovering an organization which is actively pursuing a project to get 9/11 artwork collected and viewed excited me. Since Art for Healing’s mission is to ‘...support educational programs and group projects that emphasize the healing power of the visual and performing arts...’ what could be more appropriate than producing a respectful and historic book, that contains the emotional creativity of individuals who experienced 9/11,” states Ms Seufert.

Ms. Ellis, director for Art for Healing NYC, posed as the central theme to the book the question “where were you on 9/11 and the days after?” She states “It is important to collect the sincere, whether dramatic or not, true stories, art and photographs, of people from all walks of life, both amateur and professional, also including those of our children. I hope enough time has passed so that those who were affected can bear to send their experiences to be preserved forever in an elegant book form, before the true stories are gone forever.”

Ms Seufert would like to invite all New Jersey residents, including children, of the Metropolitan area who were here on 9/11/01, to submit one page of poetry, lyrics, story, photography or artwork to be included in “The Days After...9/11/01 in New York City” (Submission Guidelines can be found on www.ArtforHealingNYC.org) Deadline is October 12, 2006. The proceeds raised from this project will be donated to Art for Healing NYC to continue to assist visual and performing artists in sharing their art with our community through workshops with children and the elderly and through other special projects. To promote the book and collect submissions, free open readings have been scheduled in New York City. Ms Seufert would also like to extend an invitation to attend the next reading which will take place on Monday September 11th, 4 P.M. at the Donnell Library on 20 W. 53rd St. across from the Museum of Modern Art.

About Art for Healing NYC
Art for Healing, NYC is a not for profit visual and performing arts foundation incorporated in the state of New York in May 2000. They support educational programs and group projects that emphasize the healing power of the visual and performing arts with all levels of the public. Under Art for Healing NYC umbrella, visual and performing artists and writers are encouraged to share their talents with all levels of the community. Their gallery is free for an artistic presentation. Art for Healing, Inc. offers free or low cost consultation to artists. It is their belief that involvement with the arts provides all human beings with the ability to enjoy their life experiences and gain a greater understanding of their inner self in a peaceful and fulfilling way.

Article Source: http://www.share.onlypunjab.com

www.ArtforHealingNYC.org

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