The Geography of Resistance

Earlier today I interviewed the artist Heather Haynes for my book on resilience. I initially approached Heather expecting that the focus of our interview would involve her experiences meeting and interviewing African children who had lost their parents during the violent war in the Democratic Republic of Congo. In fact, Heather was so moved by these stories of loss, tragedy, and resilience, that she decided to bear witness to these stories through an art installation entitled, “Wall of Courage”—featuring portraits of 80 orphaned African children who had lost their parents during the violent war. The “Wall of Courage” is 80 individual panels, each measuring 24 x 36 inches. When assembled, this stunning, and sobering art installation measures 40 feet wide by 12 feet high. I quickly realized after our interview had commenced, that Heather, herself has drawn upon her own resilience to deal with the vicarious trauma involved in being present to receive these stories of courage. During our interview, I asked Heather if there has been an undercurrent of faith or spirituality that has guided her, and if so, what does it look like… Here is Heather’s response: “Absolutely, and it really looked like nothing before I started following it. Intuition has always led me… I’ve always had a sense of where I’m supposed to go, and if I don’t follow it, I quickly know I didn’t. Being an artist has meant listening to that presence and trusting in it. As an artist, you’re walking against the grain of what is expected in society. And as a result, I had to strengthen that desire to follow this path of intuition in my life. I’ve always believed that if I continued to work hard at it, I would get more stability, and more success… So, I guess you could say that I have a faith in intuition, and that has allowed me to get to know myself. But when I was in the Congo the second time, I had a transformational experience with a young girl who had been tortured. In the three days leading up to meeting with this young lady, I had met so many other women who were victims of torture… I was feeling very raw, and pretty open… I was sitting with this young girl, whose arm had been put into the fire, and now it had turned gangrene… When I met her, she was waiting to see the doctors… She had been walking for five days… And now here she was sitting with me… the flies were swarming all around her… As we sat there together, I kept the flies off of her and I fed her… I stared into her eyes intensely for two hours. After that, I could feel a shift in me… a shift between these two worlds… I was at a point at which I had an absolute surrender moment… a real surrender of everything I thought I knew… And I can remember thinking… “Just use me.” It was as though I was summoning that universal energy… I was surrendering to being that ‘tool’… And I recognized it right away because I’ve had glimpses of this presence before in my art… “ To find out more about the Wall of Courage, please visit: http://www.heatherhaynes.com/wall-of-courage