COLLAGE: The Art for Cancer Network's photostream

COLLAGE: The Art for Cancer Network is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing innovative art programs for people living with cancer.

Art is a universal language, able to transcend boundaries and transform lives. Cancer is a devastating disease, and for people living with cancer, art can be a powerful tool for self-expression and can provide a 'creative retreat' from the daily stresses of cancer treatment.

COLLAGE: The Art for Cancer Network is named after the traditional art form of collage – the art of bringing diverse elements together to form a unique composition. As a metaphor, this underscores a core mission of COLLAGE to unite the art and cancer medicine communities to create dynamic new synergies.

The heart of COLLAGE programs are the Art Workshops and the ‘Artist-in-Residence’ Program. Accomplished and dedicated local artists work with cancer patients, survivors and family members, either in a group workshop setting, or one-on-one at the bedside.

Photographs posted on COLLAGE's Flickr page are taken by a variety of people- most often artists working with our programs or staff of COLLAGE. As people contribute more photographs, I will begin to place their bios here, so you can learn more about them.

Brent Bruni Comiskey is a contemporary artist and photographer born in Houston, Texas. He has gravitated to street art and experimental projects since youth. In the late 1980s, Brent was mentored in classic photography by Neil Gittings and subsequently spent several months in Paris and Europe shooting with a manual film camera. The 1990s were spent publishing an upstart magazine, producing music and mixing video art in warehouses and art venues. He also managed two Japanese tours for the Yoshimoto Corporation.

In the early 2000s, Brent returned to photography, shooting tens of thousands of digital images in the American south and Europe. His work has been exhibited at underground art houses like Super Happy Fun Land and formal venues such as the Station Museum of Contemporary Art, Barnevelder Arts Complex, Austin Museum of Digital Art, New Orleans Media Experience and Houston City Hall. Brent lost his sister, Christine Bruni Fondren, to cancer in 2008. The same year he was accepted as an Artist-in-Residence program for COLLAGE. Brent is currently working with COLLAGE's Artist-in-Residence program at M. D. Anderson Cancer Center. Brent's next project is a limited edition retrospective photography portfolio, available to collectors and art professionals.

Mari Omori is an artist and an art educator, born and raised in Japan. She is currently a Professor of Art at Lone Star College - Kingwood, Kingwood, TX, a position she has held since 2002. Prior to that, she has taught as an art instructor at Rice University, San Diego State University, California State University Northridge, and UCLA. Her most recent curatorial projects include “Kyomei: Resonance, Contemporary Japanese Art“ at Poissant Gallery, Houston, “affinities: Asian Pacific American Heritage Exhibition” at JPMorgan Chase in Houston, and “Asia/America,” a group exhibition in Galveston Art Center, Galveston, TX. Her recent solo-exhibitions are “ 40,000 memories,” at O’Kane Gallery, H of HD and “material witness,” at Texas State University San Marcos. Her work was included in “Texas Biennial: Austin 2005,” and “International Women Artists,” at Schneider Museum in OR. Her collaborative projects include, “Sculpture Vision” at North Harris College, Houston, “The Culture of Tea,” at Morikami Museum, FL (artist-in-residency), and numerous project-based collaborations with local artists in Texas.