Sunday Spotlight: Megan Bent
Project Title: I Don’t Want To Paint A Silver Lining Around It
Artist Statement: *A Work in Progress*
Since the spring of 2020, I have been documenting the experience of being chronically ill and immunosuppressed in the pandemic. And the experience of the outside world demanding that people like me be acceptable losses for personal convenience or for corporate profit.
The printed images illustrate the prolonged solitude of a year + in lockdown. The text stamped directly into the leaves conveys the dialogue between the administrative & public messaging to the Disability Community and my private thoughts and responses.
I use chlorophyll printing, which uses UV light to print photographic images directly onto leaves, to explore my experience of chronic illness and how illness/disability is represented in society. I am interested in the disconnect in the way disability is most often understood as a purely negative experience and the way the fragility of nature is seen with a lens of reverence.
The chlorophyll printing process (where one print/exposure may take anywhere from 8- 72 hours) relies on flexibility, interdependence with nature, and echos my experience of Crip Time, living in a body/mind that values slowing down, connection, and care over speed and production.
The action of printing representations of disability onto leaves highlights the organic nature of disability, reframing it as a part of human diversity. Printing my medical imagery is a reclamation of my medicalized body. I create these images with love and care, and in the process, the parts of me that are seen as deficient in the medical world are transformed into living temporal pieces of beauty. The fact that chlorophyll prints are impermanent, and will continue to decay over time, asks the viewer to confront the interdependence and bodily impermanence we all share.
Bio: Megan Bent is an artist who explores Disability Culture and Identity through alternative process photography, film, and installation. She received her MFA and Graduate Certificate in Disability and Diversity Studies from the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa in 2012. She received her BFA from the School of Visual Arts, NY, in 2004.
Her artwork has been exhibited at The East Hawaiian Cultural Center/HMOCA in Hilo, Hawai’i, Flux Factory in Long Island City, NY, El Museo Cultural, Santa Fe, NM, The Foster Gallery, in Dedham MA, Soho Photo Gallery in Tribeca, NY, and the Austin Central Library Gallery in Austin, TX. Most recently, she exhibited new video work at F1963 in Busan, South Korea.
She is currently an artist in residence at Art Beyond Sight’s 2021 Art + Disability Residency in NY and has been an artist in residence at the Nobles School in Dedham, MA, and the Honolulu Museum of Art, HI. She has presented her work at Atlas Obscura: The Secret Arts, The Pacific Rim International Conference on Disability and Diversity in Honolulu, HI, at Other Bodies: (Self) Representation, Disability and the Media at the University of Westminster in London, U.K., and at Critical Junctures at Emory University in Atlanta, GA. Her work has been written about in Rfotofolio, Screen Bodies Journal, and in Float Photography Magazine.
You can find more of Megan’s work on her website.
Quarantine Day 7, 2020, Chlorophyll print on hydrangea leaf, 10x10",
Image description: A round brown hydrangea leaf on a black background. Printed in the light umber chlorophyll is a self-portrait where half my face is lit by the sun and my head and eyes are tilted upward.
Isolation Walk #01, 2020, Chlorophyll print on coleus leaf, 10x10"
Image description: A golden and pink coleus leaf on a black background. Printed in the chlorophyll in dark green is my shadow while walking. On the bottom, left-hand side of the frame is my hand holding a cane.
Pandemic Eugenics II, 2020, text stamped into maple leaf, 10x10”
Image description: A bright orange maple leaf on a black background with the phrase "Sacrifice the Weak" stamped into it. Quote from April 2020 Re-open the Country protests.
Taking Up Space (Internal Rebuttal), 2020, text stamped into maple leaves, 14x11”
Image description: Three red maple leaves on a black background. Stamped into them are the words "I have been sick and in pain every day for fifteen years. I am anything but weak."
Two Arms Length (Six Feet), 2021, Chlorophyll print on spotted begonia, 10x10",
Image description: A long rounded begonia leaf with yellow, green, and red hues and faint spots, on a black background. At the very left and right edges of the leaf are two masked faces. Each extending an arm that meets in the middle of the leaf exchanging a bottle of hand sanitizer.
Quarantine Day 158, 2020, Chlorophyll print on elephant ear leaf, 10x10"
Image description: A very round light green heart-shaped elephant ear leaf on a black background. Printed in the dark green chlorophyll is a self-portrait with overgrown bangs that cover my eyes and nose and only my mouth and chin are visible.
Pandemic Eugenics XXI (Vaccine Deprioritization), 2021, text stamped into ivy leaf 10x10"
Image description: A green ivy leaf on a black background. Stamped into the leaf is the text “Unwanted Task”. This is a reference to Connecticut’s decision to not prioritize high-risk communities for vaccines citing that figuring out who to prioritize and how to do it was an “unwanted task”.
OutPatient, 2021, Chlorophyll print on spotted begonia, 10x10"
Image description: A vertical spotted begonia leaf with hues of yellow, green, and a little pink on a black background. Printed in the chlorophyll is a hospital waiting room with large letters spelling “OUTPATIENT” just outside the window.
Quarantine Day 121, 2020, Chlorophyll print on hosta leaf, 10x10"
Image Description: A teardrop-shaped hosta leaf on a black background. Printed in the chlorophyll is a self-portrait while wearing a face mask. My face takes up the whole leaf and only one eye is visible through overgrown sweeping hair. The face mask is decorated with vine and leaf patterns.
Untitled (180,000 lost and counting) August 26, 2020, chlorophyll print on hosta leaf
Image Description: A heart-shaped hosta leaf on a black background. Printed in the chlorophyll is an empty hospital bed lit by the natural light of a nearby window.