Life as a Dialysis Patient...It Goes on!

As promised, here is the 10-minute film created and produced by Bamboo Shoots Inc. for Sasktel Max TV that went to air a couple of weeks ago:

 

To read more about "Dancing with Rejection: A Beginner's Guide to Immortality" (coming soon!) please point your browser to this link.

Short Film Coming: Your Preview

Over the past several weeks, Saskatoon-based Bamboo Shoots Inc.  have been industriously working on the creation of a "short film" based on my story of living with a life-long chronic health issue and its impact on my life and art. Sasktel MaxTV commissions Bamboo Shoots to romp across the countryside here in Saskatchewan to make short films on worthy subjects, events, etc.

We started off filming in my studio, with an interview and a look at some of my easel paintings.

We started off with some "show and tell" at my studio.

After the studio segment was filmed, I requested an interview from my dialysis pod. I guess you could say I am a "man on a mission" when it comes to raising awareness of kidney health and all that implies. I figured that. even though it might make some people squeamish and uncomfortable, that is just too damn bad. It's my thrice weekly reality, along with millions of other dialysis patients world-wide.

Thrice weekly dialysis treatments will (hopefully) sustain  me until my second kidney transplant.

Just a brief overview, in case you are new here... I was first diagnosed with End Stage Kidney Failure at age 20, while living and working in Toronto. This was in 1979. After about seven months on dialysis, which saved my life at the time, I received the "Gift of Life" aka a kidney transplant, donated in a singular act of love and courage by my brother Steven. His incredible act of generosity sustained me in excellent health until mid-May of 2014, at which time I returned to dialysis. Once again, this is a life-saving measure, as the toxins slowly built up in my system to dangerous levels.

Thrice-weekly dialysis treatments are once again keeping me alive as I await the "Gift of Life".

The final segment of filming took place, again at my request, in the sanctuary of Sacred Heart Church in Saskatoon. This is where my huge mural soars to a height of almost fifty feet above the alter. I felt it was very important to emphasize that people living with a chronic disease are still capable of achieving their dreams with enough ambition and focus.

My mural at Sacred Heart soars to almost 50 feet in height in the sanctuary.

It is actually quite hard to imagine the visual force of this mural when your viewing experience is limited to a photograph. I hope you can appreciate the scale of this piece by seeing the figures in the image above.

I chose to discuss the distinctly "feminist" nature of the images in the mural.

My intention with the third segment of the film was to openly disclose the rather "radical" feminist leanings incorporated into the mural design. With such a high profile platform as this (for artistic expression), I worked strategically to embed evocative references to the "male and female" aspects of God/dess. After we (the parish priest and I) were chastised (and threatened) by the powers-brokers at the Vatican that our vision of the duality of God/dess was deemed a HERESY, I became doubly determined that my artwork would reflect my personal belief that a mature God would have no difficulty with the idea of the power and grace of His feminine nature.

The "Virgin Mary" is depicted apologetically as a full-blown "Goddess".

At present, I await the link to the short film. It is already on the public airwaves and I have heard from a few friends who subscribe to MaxTV that it is a great ten-minute film. For now, I have only seen the trailer, which lasts about one minute. You can view it here. 

Michael R. Gaudet was diagnosed with end-stage renal failure only fourteen years after his father, Robert, died of kidney disease in Michael’s childhood. After his initial diagnosis, Michael was determined to achieve a measure of immortality. 

He designed and painted the seminal mural "Recovery 1", which he donated to the Toronto hospital that saved his life. This singular act cast the mold for the rest of his life, in which he battled chronic kidney disease and forged a career as one of Canada’s best-known mural painters. 

Michael has since designed and painted over 60 large murals across Canada. Today, he lives with his wife Sharon in the resort village of Manitou Beach in central Saskatchewan, where they own and operate a seasonal art gallery called “G-G’s Gallery & Gifts.” 

Michael is in the final stages of releasing Book 1 of the trilogy "Dancing with Rejection: A Beginner's Guide to Immortality". Please steer your search engine here to visit the Facebook page that was created to usher in the launch. Curious? Could this be the book for you? Come on over, we'll see you there.

From One Human Bean to Another

At the age of 21, in 1979, I designed and painted the seminal mural Recovery 1 while receiving thrice weekly dialysis therapy at Sunnybrook Medical Center in "Toronto the Good".

Photo of  Recovery 1 in 1979.

I embraced the "Recovery" motif as the perfect masthead for the Facebook page that my wife Sharon and I founded a little over two years ago. Called "Kidney Transplant Donors and Recipients" (KTDR), the site garnered an impressive nine-hundred members within the first year. Little did we realize that within a couple of years, the site would explode to over eleven thousand worldwide members!

My best attempt to breathe some contemporary "life" into the fairly low-resolution, hazy, pixelated image.

Now that I was committed to pressing this image into service once again in a high-fidelity format...namely, as the cover art for my Book 1 of the soon-to-be-unleashed memoir "Dancing with Rejection..." my publishing consultant advised me that the (above) artwork appears so severely pixelated aka blurry that it would simply not suffice, should I desire to look professional. I took this as an immediate challenge and decided to respond by creating brand-new, crisp artwork for that purpose.

Getting very close to visualizing the Cover Art for "Dancing..."

An invocation for a successful hunt? It would appear so.

Now, I can say with confidence that the artwork for the cover of "Dancing..." is going to pass muster with nary a revision after this. As the careful observer will note, I have made two conspicuous changes to the design in the 2015 version. First, I have the last (vibrant red) figure on the right-hand side striding with purpose off the edge of the canvas. Second, I have included a "Kidney" motif in the guts of that figure. He is a successful kidney transplant recipient! 

Brand-new, crisp artwork is created in 2015 to dramatically upgrade the quality of the image.

Much as the artists of the Neanderthal Age would have meticulously painted iconic images of bison, deer and hunters deep inside their ceremonial caves, I paint the vibrant figure with his transplanted kidney. In my own way, I am emulating those cave paintings with an "invocation" or "visual prayer" for my own healing once again. Everything has come around full circle...I find myself once again facing down thrice weekly dialysis treatments as I wait and pray for my quest to yield the "Gift of Life". 

Michael R. Gaudet was diagnosed with end-stage renal failure only fourteen years after his father, Robert, died of kidney disease in Michael’s childhood. After his initial diagnosis, Michael was determined to achieve a measure of immortality. 

He designed and painted the seminal mural "Recovery 1", which he donated to the Toronto hospital that saved his life. This singular act cast the mold for the rest of his life, in which he battled chronic kidney disease and forged a career as one of Canada’s best-known mural painters. 

Michael has since designed and painted over 60 large murals across Canada. Today, he lives with his wife Sharon in the resort village of Manitou Beach in central Saskatchewan, where they own and operate a seasonal art gallery called “G-G’s Gallery & Gifts.” 

Michael is in the final stages of releasing Book 1 of the trilogy "Dancing with Rejection: A Beginner's Guide to Immortality". Please steer your search engine here to visit the Facebook page that was created to usher in the launch. Curious? Could this be the book for you? Come on over, we'll see you there.