We all carry scars – visible and invisible. This image is from my most recent surgery for skin cancer. The pathology results showed that not all of the cancer could be removed, and I am therefore facing another operation.
As an artist, I have long moved between the darkness and the light of human existence. To see – and to dare to see – is, for me, one of art’s most essential tasks. I have no answers to life’s great questions. Instead, I try to open doors onto what we might prefer to turn away from: vulnerability, pain, fear and the unknown. The physical and the psychological meet within our bodies; both leave their traces.
Perhaps life is not about constantly climbing higher on the ladder. Perhaps what truly matters is how we care for one another when someone falls. At a time when humanism and compassion too often seem to be pushed aside, our responsibility towards one another becomes all the more important.
I still believe in transformation. In the possibility of discovering light through darkness – and of learning, through our wounds, to see the world with different eyes.
And so I feel an immense gratitude towards my wonderful family, my friends, and everyone I have had the privilege of working with. My deepest and most heartfelt thanks also go to all of you who have saved my life: the ambulance crews, emergency and trauma teams, intensive care staff, surgeons, doctors, nurses, and every other healthcare professional who carried me when life itself seemed to fall apart.
No one named, no one forgotten. You have made it possible for me to continue living, loving, creating – and seeing.
Millions of hugs,
Lena Mattsson
