Margaret Kalms

We can all understand how people who suffer pain, chronic illness and frequent medical treatments miss out on many opportunities in life. Women with endometriosis especially suffer missed opportunities because of severe chronic pain and recurring symptoms.

We’re excited about offering a series of art and photography workshops free of charge to women with endometriosis, a nasty, painful, chronic illness. With your support, this is a very achievable goal.

Artistic expression gives different ways to show the impacts of endometriosis on women’s lives. This can enable women to come to better terms with their reality, give meaning to their illness and take charge of their personal illness journey.

Margaret will be teaching photography and PhotoShop skills. She is the photographer behind ‘Life with Endometriosis’. Her art photographs are inspired by what women with endometriosis have told her. She does minimal directing in her photos, allowing the women to express their ideas and emotions with their own poses and facial expressions. She has exhibited her art photography for over ten years, in Canberra, UK, Canada and France.

Susan will be teaching painting and drawing. She’s an experienced visual artist who’s worked previously with people with Alzheimer's and Parkinson’s disease in an art as therapy setting. She saw the positive responses in these people and believes that art may be helpful for women with Endometriosis.

We are hosting two sets of classes with a total of 20 hours tuition:

• one set of 6 evening classes of 2 hours each, being 12 hours tuition.
• one set of 2 Sunday afternoon classes of 4 hours each, being 8 hours tuition.

Normally art and photography workshops cost hundreds of dollars which would be a considerable barrier for women with endometriosis.  

We have won an artist’s residency which gives us the use of ‘Playing Field’ art studio in Canberra to host our workshops. We have already done some fund-raising but we need more funding to provide the sufficient art materials. When making art, it is important to allow for free creative expression without worrying about limited materials. We need lots of paints, brushes and sponges, finishing lacquer, cartridge paper and canvasses of different sizes.

Of course, there are the usual expenses of an art project, production costs, printing, publicity and advertising.

Your support, will make a huge difference! You’ll be enabling women to be creative and learn new skills. With your donations we can offer our art and photography workshops to women with endometriosis at no cost to them. 

This is a very achievable goal.

We are truly grateful for every donation however small or large.

You can follow ‘Life with Endometriosis’ on Facebook.com/lifewithendometriosis.

Please share this through your networks, and friends on social media. 

Thank you enormously for your support. 

Proposed budget $1,800:

• $470 workshop production costs
• $150 visual art diaries for participants
• $450 art materials such as paints, pastels, brushes, sponges and finishing lacquer
• $410 cartridge paper and small canvases
• $100 paper and printing of handouts and course materials for participants
• $50 printing small prints of photographs of participants
• $70 printing flyers and posters for promotion of workshops
• $100 Pozible fee and transaction fees

Painting and drawing expression requires a range of materials especially for a group. 

The challenge is to give the students sufficient resources to allow for free expression without hindering their creativity. Creative learning requires practice, lots of attempts and lots of exploration with the materials.