Smith Farm Center for Healing and the Arts
WISH LIST: $100: 3-hour artist residency for patients at a local hospital; $500: stipend for a 1-month, part-time cancer navigator at a local church in Southeast; $1000: scholarship assistance for 2 cancer patients to attend a weeklong residential supportive retreat
Founded in 1996 by Washington artist Barbara Smith Coleman, who actively supported her brother during his struggle with cancer (and was later diagnosed herself), Smith Farm aids cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, and physicians as they struggle with questions about life, death, and meaning—working with the human experience of cancer that conventional medicine often doesn't address. Caregiver and patient support groups, workshops on stress reduction, and classes in poetry, drawing, mask making, journal writing, and art and clay design, offer the opportunity for self-expression. A new gallery on U Street displays the work. Day- and week-long retreats, many offered in the beautiful countryside surrounding the District, let patients and caregivers explore a wide range of resources for healing; scholarships are available for those who cannot afford the retreats’ already reduced costs and a special effort is made to reach the medically underserved. Seventeen local artists—writers, poets, musicians, and dancers—also work with patients and caregivers in medical and surgical units and the outpatient infusion center at the Washington Cancer Institute, Howard University Hospital Cancer Center, and Holy Cross Hospital. Smith Farm instituted the first breast cancer "patient navigator" program at Howard (navigators help patients travel through the system and overcome barriers to care) and has also developed a national training program. Each year, Smith Farm reaches over 6,000 people affected by cancer and other illnesses. A two-time recipient of the Virginia Kelly Award for excellence in cancer survivorship from the Susan G Komen Foundation, Smith Farm deserves your generous support.
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