Denise Di Novi’s Portal exhibition holds space for grief
By MARRIE STONE
Grief is lonely business. When a parent, partner or – God forbid – child dies, the people left behind are set adrift, forced to make sense of the loss largely alone. Sudden and unexpected deaths, or out-of-order fatalities (deaths of children or younger siblings), are particularly painful. Well-meaning friends and family often don’t know what to say, and a shroud of silence can descend over the experience, leaving the bereaved without many outlets to share their suffering.
On March 20, 2020 – the day before the world drew up its drawbridge and locked its doors to the pandemic – Denise Di Novi’s husband died of pancreatic cancer. They’d been married only five years, one of those miracle later-in-life loves that make partners feel extra grateful. He lived just over a year after his diagnosis, time enough for a trip to Europe, but mostly time to sit quietly with his wife, marveling at the trees in their backyard and saying all the things that needed saying.
Photo by Molly Marler
Denise Di Novi’s “Portals” is on display at The Honarkar Foundation through September 14. Di Novi, a film producer and director, turned to painting in the aftermath of her husband’s death in 2020.
Three days after his death, Di Novi picked up a pencil and began to draw. She’d never dabbled in the arts. Had no formal training. Her 35-year career as a producer and director (known for films like Heathers, Ed Wood and Little Women) was collaborative instead of solitary. But suddenly she felt compelled to paint. “It came out of nowhere,” she said. “I can’t explain it. It’s like I was in a trance.” The act of creation was the only way she could quiet her mind.
What emerged was a series of artworks that looked as though Di Novi peered over the veil of the afterlife to see what lay on the other side. “Where did he go?” she asked. “Anyone who’s lost someone shares that wonder. My paintings were trying to see the unseeable. I’m not smart enough to understand quantum physics, but the little I understand is there are other dimensions. There’s so much we don’t see. What I don’t see doesn’t mean he’s not here in some way.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
“Windows” (2024) provides a subconscious vision of the afterlife
That desire to see behind the veil connected with audiences. Last week, a visitor to the exhibition sat among Di Novi’s paintings in tears. She’d lost her son two years ago and found solace in the work. Her experience isn’t uncommon. Di Novi’s exhibit has spawned both private messages and attention from the press.
“I had no idea the show would get the response it did,” she said. “People say it gives them permission to talk about their experiences. They feel very alone, and they don’t know what to do with their grief, how to process it. I came to see that expressing it in whatever way feels right for you helps to heal.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
“The Gate” (2023) explores the veil that separates the living from the dead
Di Novi’s Grief Series 1-6, begun just three days after her husband’s death, erupted from a well of instinct. The bright colored markers in abstract forms might be construed as crosses, cancer cells, DNA strands or birthing imagery. “A doctor told me he could tell I was visualizing different aspects of the body in that series,” she said. “I had no clue. It’s all very subconscious for me.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
“The Grief Series 1-6” (2020) are sketches produced in the immediate aftermath of her husband’s death, before Di Novi began painting
As time passed and Di Novi picked up paint brushes instead of pencils, her work grew more layered and textured. “People say it takes years for artists to learn how to break the rules. But I never learned the rules,” she said. “Most of my paintings are mixed media and I love learning how to put oil over acrylic. They’re both intuitive and experimental, and they’re constantly changing. The only consistency is there are lots of layers.”
The metaphor of layering is reinforced by the symbolism of the space in which the work is shown. The newly opened Honarkar Foundation resides in the town’s old post office on Broadway, a building closed to the public for decades when Orange County developer Gerald Buck used the property to store his personal art collection. Inviting the public inside this once private space to view this highly personal project reinforces Di Novi’s intention to share her intimate experiences.
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
The building where The Honarkar Foundation is located (298 Broadway) was closed for decades and is now open to the public
While several of Di Novi’s pieces invite the viewer behind that thin veil that separates the living from the dead, other works speak to the survivor’s need to endure and keep living. She sometimes uses text inside the paintings as subconscious reminders about how to carry on.
The words “right now” and “then” are embedded in a diptych of twin triangles entitled A Pair and Begin Again incorporating the French word “recommencez.” Look to the Sun contains the simple word “look.”
Di Novi said, “I love looking at sunsets. My husband would always say, ‘Don’t look at the sun. It’s bad for your eyes.’ How am I going to see the sunset if I don’t look at it? I guess I’m an innately rebellious person. So, I did a painting of the sun and put ‘look’ on it. A reminder to keep that spirit of strength and rebelliousness.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
“Look to the Sun” (2024)
Western cultures aren’t adept at processing grief. Suppressing it, Di Novi warns, only delays the inevitable. Sorrow sneaks through the back door, even if you’ve barricaded the front. The only way out is through, and art offered her a creative path forward.
But there are other things she found useful throughout her intentional grief journey. If you’re inside this experience, Di Novi recommends several resources that proved helpful. Two books – Bearing the Unbearable by Joanne Cacciatore and It’s OK That You’re Not OK by Megan Devine – served her well. Cacciatore founded the Selah Carefarm (click here) in Sedona, Ariz. in 2020. She rescues abused, neglected and tortured animals (alpacas, goats, horses, donkeys, dogs, cats, cows and others) and invites the grieving to commune with the creatures. She’s discovered that bereaved families who spend time with animals in recovery form a connection important to the healing of both humans and animals. All proceeds from Di Novi’s art sales go to Selah’s Carefarm.
“I went there twice and that was a huge turning point for me. I can’t imagine what my journey would have been like without her,” Di Novi said. “And I highly recommend her book at any point, no matter how many years have gone by.”
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Photo by Jeff Rovner
“Begin Again” (2022)
For some, Portals may feel more like an experience than an art exhibition. It opens a space for hard conversations and quiet contemplation, and it offers hope to those caught in the morass of suffering. It also might inspire folks to pick up a brush and see what comes. The subconscious is stranger and more powerful than you think.
Portals is on display at the Honarkar Foundation through September 14. For more information, visit their website here.
