“In this exhibition, I trace the lineage of my art practice back to this space, the places around Worcester where I was supported, cared for, and challenged. Places such as the Worcester Art Museum and UMass hospital, and other institutions created familiar spaces for me to find comfort and community, as well as an opportunity to grow as an artist. While growing up with a chronic illness, Cystic Fibrosis, making art was one of the few constants in my life available to me during times of health and decline; creating in itself a comfort measure as important as complying with treatments and taking medications.”
Through various media, with a focus on drawing, painting, and performance, Dominic Quagliozzi makes work that deconstructs his lived experience with chronic illness and disability to explore personal histories and the domestication of illness. Using medicalized materials such as hospital gowns and clinic table tissue paper, Quagliozzi references his de- and re-constructed body, often present through its absence. His work aims to highlight the interdependence needed for healing and notions of longevity within personal and shared experience.
