When New York artist Prune Nourry was diagnosed with breast cancer, she decided to document the experience of her treatment and its impact on her life and art in her film Serendipity.
Her career thus far has focused primarily on the female form and fertility. She works in various media, including sculpture, video, and photography. This project began as a book published to accompany her show at the Guimet National Asian Art Museum in Paris in 2017.
“…artist Prune Nourry was diagnosed with breast cancer, she decided to document the experience of her treatment…”
Interspersed with her trips to the doctor to be treated, she parallels those moments with tours of her works, the coincidence (she says she does not believe in coincidence) of the subject matter resonating with the changes in her own body and life.
She is diagnosed at age 30, much too young to have seriously contemplated mortality, but that changes with the illness. She is faced with the reality of having to store her eggs since the radiation and chemotherapy often damage fertility. She undergoes a mastectomy and reconstructive surgery, as well.
"…the picture of an artist as a patient, neither out of control, nor particularly brave and stoic..."
