The Risk Pictures: Stephanie Kielb, MD
2024, charcoal, acetate, papers, embroidery floss, crystals, jewelry parts, metal pins, wire. Dimensional collage. 44" x 30" x 2.5" ​
Stephanie Kielb was my doctor for about eight years, until she decided to resign from a major Chicago hospital. Her portrait grew out of our discussions of the corporatization of medicine, where the focus is on billing and the pressure to do more in less time, as well as waning physician autonomy, and the toxicity of her work environment.
The portrait is roughly divided into two aspects of her career: above are “clouds” are filled with her documentation of abusive communication from administration. Below, she is entangled in a net filled with medical certificates, conference papers, ephemera from the urological hospital she volunteers at in Rwanda, thank-you cards and letters from patients and trainees and staff from the hospital she left. A selection of positive artifacts from her 21 years in her Chicago practice.
As part of my commitment to personal and mutual risk in portraiture, the works includes explicit pieces of my medical records, and a small drawing at lower right shows me as an inpatient.
​