Community Canvas is an initiative presented by The Culture Show where GBH features artwork from community members on our Digital Mural.
Today’s mural by Christine Palamidessi celebrates women runners. In 1967, Katherine Switzer hid her gender in order to enter the Boston Marathon. Along the way, race managers assaulted her and tried to rip off her 261 bib number because women were not allowed to participate. Switzer finished the race in 4 hours and 20 minutes. The path paved by Switzer accommodated eight women who officially ran the Boston Marathon in 1972. Later on, women were permitted to run the marathon in the 1984 Olympics.
“My Women Running Series draws on my own experience as a runner,” Palamidessi says. “The dog in the lower circles of this artwork was my training companion.”
Palamidessi is known in the art world for a practice that spans writing, filmmaking, sculpture, and printmaking. She interweaves memory formation and time perception with the female form. Her work typically shows fragmented artifacts, myths, and words that have been partially reconstructed using tactile traditional materials, such as paper, plaster, and inks.
See more of Palamidessi’s work on Instagram @palamidessi.art and palamidessi.com
