Artist's Statement: Asthma.

Abstract

During my pediatrics rotation at a community hospital in Baltimore, I was able to witness the high prevalence of asthma in the youth of the city; I saw patient after patient present to the emergency department in respiratory distress from asthma exacerbations. Upon arrival, they received nebulizer treatments that would envelop them in a cloud of bronchodilator spray seeping out from their masks. My digital painting Asthma, on the cover of this issue, represents a composite of my experiences seeing patients with asthma, or indeed any patient burdened with medical equipment. The girl in my portrait is wearing a nebulizer mask, which I implied to be the source of the mist obscuring her. However, I also wanted to give the sense that she is being suffocated by her environment through my portrayal of her eyes piercing through the mist. The round shapes of her curly hair echo the shimmering clouds, as if they are each an extension of the other. The past few years of near-constant masking due to the COVID-19 pandemic have forced us to become accustomed to seeing faces with the lower half entirely covered, with only the eyes exposed. So much can be communicated through the eyes, yet there is still more left unsaid when they are all we can see.Asthma