Exhibitions
| TOP STORIES |  | | | | | | FEATURES | | | | | | MAYOR NEWS | | | | TRAVEL | | | | COMPETITIONS | | |
|
|
|
Art keeps me alive, says HIV positive painter
 |
| Artist Gill Hickman works on Happy Cells in her Brockley studio |
The therapeutic qualities of art have long been recognised and they are often used
alongside complimentary health treatments.
This idea of art as therapy has formed the basis of Brockley-based artist Gill Hickman's latest collection of work, Happy Cells.
In 1989 Gill was diagnosed HIV positive.
Art works such as Happy Cells are what Gill credits with keeping her healthy for 18 years, without drugs.
When diagnosed, Gill was working as a nursery school headteacher and, although naturally creative, she only dabbled in art occasionally.
In 1991 she married and Gill and her husband decided they wanted to have a baby.
The marriage wasn't working out and soon Gill decided being a single mum was
better for her.
"It was a horrible time," said Gill.
"I was signed off with
depression for one month which soon turned into six.
"I started going to art classes. It was a mother and baby thing. So my son could play with other babies and I had two hours to be an artist."
She added: "As a teacher, I would always visit the open studios and look at the
pictures and think, 'I would like to do this someday'. It seemed like a dream which would never happen."
It was the art which helped her through the low points.
"I didn't think I would be alive when my son was five. I had these thoughts I would die after 10 years.
"But I soon found the art was helping me find ways of expressing what I was going through with the HIV."
"I went through a stage where I just did white prints. I saw that as I was whitewashing over the difficult times."
"I can see how the work
explored my feelings."
The focus for Gill is now on the Happy Cells, which keep us well and infection at bay.
She will be exhibiting her work as part of the Brockley Open Studios.
Open Studios, June 30 to July 2. Visit gillhickman.com
4:40pm Tuesday 26th June 2007
Print 
Email this 
Comment
What are these links for?
If you liked this article and would like to share it with others on the web who might be searching for good content we've made it easy for you to do it.
At the bottom of all articles, you'll see links to six sites. These sites - commonly called 'social bookmark' or 'social news' sites - have large communities of web users who share and rate interesting, useful and fun things on the web.
Clicking the links will automatically add the address of the story you are reading to one of these sites, letting you share it with others. Each site will ask you to register to share stories. Registration is free and once a member, you can store, recommend and search for stories that interest you.
More on Digg
More on del.icio.us
More on Furl
More on reddit
More on NowPublic/
More on Yahoo!
