GLEN BURNIE, Md. — Next month marks four years since the World Health Organization announced COVID-19 as a pandemic.
UM Baltimore Washington Medical Center has now teamed up with the nonprofit Art with a Heart to create a mosaic mural to recognize, honor, and remember the impact of healthcare workers.
As Mary Bennett lays pieces of glass onto the mosaic, she recalls her husband's time at UM Baltimore Washington Medical Center.
"He was here first floor, second floor, third floor, he was here for six months," said Bennett.
It was 2020, and he was sick with COVID.
"I saw the tender loving care that they gave my husband. They kept him alive. And for that, I owe this hospital my heart,” said Bennett.
It's what brought her back to the hospital in Glen Burnie. To join in creating artwork that will honor the sacrifice, strength, and resilience when COVID started.
It’s called the COVID-19 Memorial Art Project. Representing when the community and healthcare workers had to stand together to get through the unknown
"It was a time of such uncertainty, of fear, because no one really knew about what was happening or what it was going to actually look like when it came,” said Kathy Burk, the Executive Director of UM BWMC Foundation
The project will consist of a combination of ceramics, mosaics, and glass.
"There are about 500 green ceramic leaves that we'll be able to write messages in and kind of words of inspiration,” said Burk.
Teaming up with the nonprofit Art with a Heart, a mural that will go on the wall in the atrium.
During six workshops, hospital team members will join patients and their loved ones to create pieces of the mural.
"When you think about the symbolism of the mural, it pretty much sums up what we went through in 2020,” said Burk.
"We've created a very natural installation that will include mandalas and trees and leaves," said Randi Pupkin, the Art with a Heart Executive Director. "The symbolism of a mandala is the transformation of suffering into one of joy that symbolizes harmony and unity and represents that everything is connected.”
The hospital will install the mural in May.
"It's very touching. I looked at what it's going to look like when it's finished, and I was so impressed. And for my husband, this means the world to me,” said Bennett.
Although her husband has since passed, Bennett said looking at the artwork, he'll always be remembered.
