Newsday — July 24, 2002

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Photographed by Matt Sesow from his press packets, October 18, 2026; text transcribed from the photos by Claude.

NEWSDAY, WEDNESDAY, JULY 24, 2002

Art Therapy
Show exhibits works by trauma survivors

By Dave Behrens
STAFF WRITER

On the walls of the small gallery, the artworks reflect decades of pain.

They are the handiwork of dozens of artists, all survivors of trauma. Here and there are glimmers of joy and hope but mostly the collection articulates a stunning litany of traumatic experiences: sexual abuse and domestic violence, rape and incest, emotional abuse and mental disorders, blindness and brain injury, war-related trauma and illnesses such as cancer, multiple sclerosis and AIDS.

But these works are meant to be an affirmation of survival — in paintings, drawings, sculpture and poetry. The show, "Breaking the Walls of Bias: Art From Survivors," is on display at the Emily Lowe Gallery on Hofstra University's Hempstead campus through Aug. 2.

What brought this curious assemblage of creative energies to the campus is part of a story that began more than 30 years ago — during the adolescence of a Long Island woman who survived deeply scarring traumas of her own.

Candyce Brokaw is married now, a Long Island resident since the 1980s and the mother of three daughters. In 1997, she created the Survivors Art Foundation, an organization for people like herself. And a year later, she created an innovative exhibition hall — on the Internet.

Talking about being the victim of rape and sexual abuse — and the nightmarish shadows that linger on — is something that Brokaw, now 48, has learned to handle.

The sexual abuse continued through her teen years, she will explain, matter-of-factly. There were a number of perpetrators. There are no details to give. No point in that, she said during an interview at her home in Quogue. These days, the focus is on survival.

During the early years of marriage, she merely coped. "I had these complicated mechanisms to get me through the years," she remembered. "I was always on the go, always busy with kids, sleeping a lot when I couldn't keep busy."

She had never discussed sexual abuse with her therapists. "It had always been a secret . . . But it's like a neglected tooth — it doesn't go away by itself. When I was 38 years old, I couldn't run away anymore. I could no longer deal with it."

Slowly, however, through the mid-1990s, she started to pull her life together. "It was a combination of therapy, medication and, most of all, my art and poetry," she said. And her art — mostly drawings and poems — became an even more intense part of her life.

Art is not enough, of course. "You need a support system — family and friends and therapy and, in some cases, medication." But her work with pen-and-ink helped to purge her recurring feelings of terror.

"It is a way to let out the feelings beyond words. Art is a sign language from your guts."

Once, she had drawn a surreal figure, one of the shadowy perpetrators in her past. "I drew a little girl cuddling beside this figure. I drew it without thinking. It was complete catharsis. It blew my

See BROKAW on B20

[Photo caption] Candyce Brokaw created Survivors Art Foundation and its Internet exhibition hall for people like herself. (Newsday Photo / Ken Spencer)

[Photo caption] "The Peace of the World Is in My Veins" by Maggie Parr is one of 35 works on display at the Hofstra show.

[Handwritten note on the page] "Breaking The walls of Bias", Hofstra Univ. New York 2002, ("Join Hands" 6'x4', oil on canvas)