Cinco's Gift

When chemotherapy caused Candy Robbins to lose her hair, Cinco, her cat, began sleeping on her head every night. I felt that this simple, knowing, generous, and vigilant providing of comfort might be well represented and perpetuated by the form of a large, hand-knit, furry blanket. Candy's wish to reciprocate this support to Cinco, her family and friends is great, and to illustrate this beautiful (and often somehow humorous) interdependancy, I have outlined the image of Cinco on Candy's head and repeated it as a chain-like motif on the blanket. I was extremely humbled and intimidated by the prospect of doing justice to such a heart-wrenching issue, but ultimately, I realized that while I had no cure or information to offer, what I did have was an elegantly hopeful image and the desire to generate warmth, which can heal.

'Art For the Cure,' an exhibit and fundraiser sponsored by the Komen Foundation and Via Christi Hospital of Wichita, was an invitational project in which artists were asked to create a piece in response to the story of a local survivor of breast cancer.

Stephanie Lanter 2006

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