N. Catherine Fraser, BScN, RN, Dip. Art Therapy, IBP Cert., is an artist, an art therapist in private practice, and a public health nurse with the Vancouver Island Health Authority in Duncan, British Columbia, Canada. A professional artist since 1983, Fraser has had 24 one-woman shows and currently exhibits in three galleries. She works in several formats, including painting, photography, clay sculpture, and mixed media. Her work has recently been featured on the cover of The HeART of Nursing: Expressions of Creative Art in Nursing (second edition, Sigma Theta Tau International, 2005), as well as on this month's AJN cover and in Art of Nursing.
This painting, Herb Store, was part of a project, Art and Healing: People Helping People, that Fraser began in celebration of the founding in 1912 of the Registered Nurses Association of British Columbia. The project was supported in part by the Registered Nurses Association of British Columbia.
Fraser writes, "I took a year's sabbatical and traveled 60,000 miles in a van that became my home and studio. I was most interested in depicting people caring for people and people within their environments. I visited nurses, physicians, other health care workers, and artists throughout British Columbia and Alberta, Canada. Wherever I went, I gave shows and talks about my experiences. The people I met shared their stories with me and took me to visit people in their communities.
"The photographs and paintings made during the trip were shared as I traveled, culminating in shows at the Prince George Art Gallery in Prince George and the Great West Art Gallery in Chemainus, British Columbia, and displays at annual and chapter meetings of the Registered Nurses Association of British Columbia." Fraser hopes to write a book about her experiences on the road.
Of the cover art, she adds, "The man in the painting was an herbalist in a Chinese herb store in Vancouver's Chinatown district. As an artist I'm interested in patterns and shapes, and I liked the colors and the arrangement of items on the shelves."
For more of Fraser's work, visit http://www.members.shaw.ca/catherinefraserart/index.html.
Sylvia Foley, senior editor