October, 2006

New Jersey Sculptor Mary Ellen Scherl is inviting breast cancer survivors—women and men—across the country to cast their chests for Mamorial, a sculpture project designed to catalyze healing and celebrate survival. Fifty hand-made molds of survivor chests, whether post detection, radical mastectomy, or reconstructive surgery, debuted in Tenafly, New Jersey on April 27 and will travel to Pittsfield, MA October 4-8 to help kick off National Breast Cancer Awareness Month and Think Pink, a Berkshire County NBCAM event. The exhibit will be held at The Storefront Gallery on Fenn Street and live mold-making sessions will be ongoing Friday, Saturday and Sunday. There have been similar mold-making sessions in cities across the east coast including Manchester, VT, Tampa, FL, New York City, Tenafly and Hackensack, NJ. Mamorial is working toward a major NYC installation which is being designed by the innovative and internationally renowned architecture and design firm, the Rockwell Group.

“Women’s bodies are fetish-ized throughout pop-culture; Mamorial invites women -and men- whose bodies have been ravaged by this disease to memorialize and re-claim their bodies. This work is about people’s feelings towards their bodies as opposed to public perceptions of bodies or disease,” says the artist.

Scherl’s paradigm of art as a cathartic process originated from working on a series of life-size sculptures of an obese, nearly 400-pound woman. The artist spent several years creating art that celebrated her model’s inner and outer beauty while challenging standard conventions of beauty. As time passed, however, the model’s joints deteriorated and her health problems mounted. Yet, being a part of the art ultimately had the effect of catalyzing her decision to change her life which resulted in an enormous weight loss that dramatically improved her health.

Through email outreach and personal referrals over the last several months, Scherl found willing participants across the country and sent them Mamorial mold-making kits by post; she also held group mold-making sessions and worked one-on-one with breast cancer survivors. “You peeled away my pain,” said Sandria Thomas after her mold was made.

“This concept could be to breast cancer survivors what the Vietnam Memorial in DC is to Vietnam Veterans,” said Mindy Goldfischer, MD, Associate Director and Chief of Breast Imaging Englewood Hospital.

Scherl’s goal is for these unique facsimiles to become a traveling exhibition across the country and beyond our borders. Scherl has witnessed how art, a universal language, can heal. Unlike other efforts, Mamorial viscerally demonstrates the horrific 1:7 statistics. Mamorial has already raised public awareness to a higher level and has motivated early screening, and it is committed to mobilizing a harder fight against breast cancer by generating a new stream of fundraising dollars. The Mamorial vision is to create the “tipping point” for the eradication of breast cancer in the world.

For more information visit www.mamorial.org
To make an appointment for a mold making session, please call 201-568-3626.

CONTACT: Mary Ellen Scherl, Founder 201-568-3626, Susan Present, Public Relations 973-762-5894. For more information please visit www.mamorial.org