oh my God! – it’s full of stars!

oh my God! - it's full of stars! - mixed media, by Peter Strohmeyer
“A Portrait of a Fine Lady, Santa Paula”

This photo of my wife Paula K. Rudd, of 27 years, circa 2016, was taken through the side-glass window of our car on a rainy afternoon. Her hair is sprouting after completing stage 4 breast cancer chemo regime, a mastectomy, a lymphadenectomy of 14 nodes, 12-week radiation, and reconstruction surgery (twice). She survives today.  Even as recently as 2020, she was diagnosed with a metastasized reoccurance near her bladder. 9-months of bilateral nephrostomy tubes, and another successful response to treatment. Her hair is sprouting again.

This work combines references to: the title of the piece is from a scene in “2001 – A Space Odyssey”,  a quote “We’re made of star stuff” by Carl Sagan, and iconography religious paintings from the middle ages of saints with halos.  Like the French “Realists” of the 1800’s, questioning the “nobility of subject matter worthy of creation”; Truth, Veritas, raw, unadorned, needs no approval. Bestowing sainthood is no longer reserved to the priestly class.

Peter Strohmey

Senior web designer and Supervisor for the Web Technology Group at the Spencer S. Eccles Health Sciences Library. He is a mixed media and multi-media artist combining found objects, digital photography, and video assemblage objects with pop and conceptual art undertones.

Rubor Participation:
2022 Prose, "If that’s all there is, my friends"
2021 Video, "You're the one!"
2020 Mixed media, "oh my God! - it’s full of stars!"
2018-present Website advisor
2018 Website redesign