When artist Maria Lanas spent time in the hospital with her father-in-law, Shapour, during his cancer treatments, she was inspired by the drops of chemotherapy medicine falling inside of his IV bottle. She imagined the fluid mixing with his blood and later created a series of paintings called, “Infusions.” She calls the paintings a gift from her father-in-law. “It was a release for me,” she says. “Art has been a good friend of mine.”

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Transcripts

His name was Shapur Matin Razum, and he had melanoma. So one day, I was watching how the medication would go into Shapur’s body. You know, the drips, the IV with the chemo. So I would watch each drop just go down the tube. And then I started to imagine how these drops would mix with his blood. These ideas.

started coming up on my paper, on my watercolors, and I decided to use the red colors, representing Shapur’s blood, and the vivid colors, the blues and the greens, representing the drug that was curing him. And, uh, I used the most vivid colors because this drug meant life. I chose watercolors, acrylics, because I wasn’t painting, painting.

I was mimicking the act of the water dripping, because this is what I was watching. When you see the IV, you can only see how each drop comes down the tube. So I was just dripping colors on the paper. I liked this series of work because it came from my heart, and it’s a definite gift that Shapur gave me.

It was not my intention to come out with paintings. It was a release for me. You know, art has been a good friend of mine. It has given me the opportunity to release emotions, and it has shown me the world. I have traveled because of it. So I’m very thankful for having this gift.