A change of art

Mumbai and Bengaluru-based NGO dedicated to holistic cancer care, OncoHappy, is hosting a mural art festival across cancer spaces in both cities till October 18. It kicked off on World Mental Health Day (October 10), and has witnessed various artists and art communities come together to uplift spaces such as HCG, SRCC, Asian Cancer Institute, Access Life, Mumbai OncoCare Center, Indian Cancer Society and Mangalam Foundation.

Each venue will dedicate a wall in their cancer wards, and it will receive maximum footfalls, for artists such as Avantika Mathur, Ava Nagporewalla, Kiran Waingankar, Sagarika Ganguly, Harihara Singh, Rajendra Potadar, Sunil CM, Shanaya Tata along with artist collectives, Baaya and Let's Bee Canvas, to bring the murals to life. This also includes cancer survivor and graffiti artist, Kartikey Sharma.

"We have worked with these spaces earlier. We reached out to the ones that focus on cancer treatment, and picked those that signed up first. All the artwork follows the same theme of breaking free, which is likely to resonate with cancer patients. We wanted to add colour and life into every patient's life through this project. For example, the HCG pediatric ward has 200 patients every day, and in a year over one lakh people will have gained something from these murals," explains Mansi Mehta, founder of the NGO, adding that some venues may keep the artwork beyond the one-year mark.

Moving forward, they plan to do up a wall at a hospital or cancer space every month. But even this will be restricted to patients and caregivers, and not open to all, since it could compromise the immunity of the patients.

(Clockwise from top) Murals in the cancer care wards in Mumbai

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