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Photos tribute honors senior's father's illness
Student shares her experience and stories of Lou Gehrig’s Disease in senior thesis.


Emily Luty

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The Daily Evergreen


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In her exhibit, the last step in earning a bachelor’s degree of fine arts, Catherine Gaul decided to use a topic that has produced her strongest work: Lou Gehrig’s Disease. Gaul, a WSU senior, has dealt with the disease since her father was diagnosed with it in 1999, three months after she graduated from high school.

“I’ve been photographing my father for four years now,” she said, “so I decided to continue photographing him. It was my strongest work. It obviously had the most heart in it.” The exhibit, which is on display in Gallery 3 at the Fine Arts Center, is not only about Gaul’s father, however. During the summer, Gaul met people with the disease through support groups and photographed them in their homes with their caregivers. Along with the black-and-white prints are biographies written from talking with the individuals. Those explanations, while not required, are powerful in the exhibit, said Nik Meisel, assistant fine arts professor and museum sculpture coordinator.

“She wants you to connect with that person,” said Meisel, who is one of the two faculty members Gaul has worked with for her thesis this semester. “I think Catherine’s work really speaks for itself,” Meisel said. “I’m proud of her for following her own vision.” The show is meant to teach students how to be thoughtful of presentation, he said, and allows them to manage all aspects of an exhibit, from the art itself to promotion of the exhibit. “People thought it was really neat that I wanted to share with everyone else about their disease,” Gaul said. “The biggest thing I want to express with this is it’s different with everybody.” The differences from person to person are seen through the biographies, which discuss how Lou Gehrig’s Disease has affected each individual. Carl Moore, who was photographed and plans to come to see the exhibit Friday – weather permitting – said he was shocked when he was diagnosed with the disease. “You never expect to be the person to get a terminal illness,” said Moore, who is a support-group facilitator for the ALS Association Evergreen Chapter. (Lou Gehrig’s Disease is another name for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.) However, Moore is still hopeful and wants more people to know about the disease, especially through Gaul’s photographs. Still, the disease – which results in people’s losing the ability to use their muscles – is a difficult one to watch, Gaul said. Since she began her project, three people have died – two before she was able to photograph them, she said. When talking to her subjects before photographing them, Gaul said, they mostly seemed to find something positive about the disease. Several of them told Gaul they learned who their real friends were. Gaul said that in doing the project, she also learned about a whole community of people who deal with the disease. Before learning about the support groups, she sometimes felt isolated in dealing with the disease, she said. Connecting with ALS groups has also brought up opportunities for exhibiting her work again, although the details are still being worked out, Gaul said.

Wherever her work is displayed, however, she hopes it raises awareness, she said.

“I want it to be informative and emotional and positive at the same time,” Gaul said.
http://www.dailyevergreen.com/story/20335