Himmelfarb’s 36th annual art show is in full swing, bringing an exciting range of photography, acrylics, water colors, knitting, and mixed media to Himmelfarb’s first floor. If you haven’t already, come take a study break and peruse the work of your fellow students, staff, and faculty.
In the meantime, enjoy this sampling of work and the artists in their own words.
And if you’d like to drop a few lines about your art or creative process, email them to randy.plym@gwu.edu. Every piece has a story, and we love to hear them.
Frederick Jacobsen's "Giverny Lilies" [Photograph]
As a photographer and clinical researcher into the effects of light on the brain and behavior I am very attuned to the continually shifting perspectives of light and color in my environment. Visiting Monet's Giverny pond and gardens provided me the opportunity to view and feel how this exquisite environment facilitated his remarkable Nymphéas paintings while suffering progressive visual loss (due to bilateral cataracts). "Giverny Lilies" is an homage to Monet’s work and vision through a 21st century lens.
Frederick M. Jacobsen, Faculty, SMHS
Brittany Smith's "VA Mountains" [Watercolor on Paper]
I believe 'VA Mountains' is one of my earliest watercolor paintings. It is inspired by a photo I took many years ago during my time at UVA when some friends and I drove along Blue Ridge Parkway. That day was one of my favorite days when I was an undergraduate student and the painting serves as a reminder of that mini-road trip.
In terms of process, I have a simple painting style since I'm trying to figure out watercolor as a medium. This was painting in a beginner's class and my instructor actually helped with the texture of the stone railing along the road. I haven't painted anything new in a few years, but I want to return to watercolor soon and fill a sketchbook with watercolor experiments to build my confidence as a painter.
Brittany Smith, Staff, Himmelfarb
Rebecca Kyser's "Quackery" [Ink and Colored Pencil on Paper]
I'm a big believer in the power of comics to make scientific and historical topics more accessible to the public. So when I heard about the art show, it seemed the best opportunity to put that belief into practice.
Rebecca Kyser, Staff, Himmelfarb
Mehrshad Fahim Devin's "Post-Op" [Photograph]
Post-op was inspired by the conversation's I've had with patients as a medical student. I've had the opportunity to speak with some patients both before and after a surgical operation. I found that pre-op patients held a lot of uncertainty and fear for the future; but after the surgery, amidst the pain and recovery, their eyes almost always glimmered with relief. The piece is meant to represent this relief.
Mehrshad Fahim Devin, Student, SMHS
Basil Considine's "The Faerie Queene of New Prague: the Court" [Digital Photo Painting and Composite]
You probably haven't heard of New Prague, Minnesota (population: 8,000), but hundreds of schoolchildren in Madagascar can find it on a map. Why? The city – and its mischievous Faerie Queen, who wants everything done properly and turns pirates into frogs – were front and center in a series of storytelling performances that I delivered as a Fulbrighter. Each time I visited their school, the children begged to hear more stories about cold, snowy Minnesota (Brr!) and the beautiful Faerie Queen. And then, one day, a teacher asked me if there was a picture of her...
How can you compete with a child's imagination? That's a challenge for any artist, but I had a good set of raw materials: a photo shoot with the model for the Faerie Queen (Lisa Bark, an actor from New Prague, MN), a flair for theatrical makeup, and a lifetime of adoring complex Renaissance tableaus and Pre-Raphaelite paintings. Throw in a set of original fairy tales that I'd crafted for the children, a set of digital painting brushes in Photoshop, and I started to sketch a set of storybook scenes and fill them with extra details – to reward staring at the picture again and again.
Some people say that digital painting is faster. You don't have to wait for paint to dry, but after more than 400 layers and more than 10,000 brush strokes...not for me!
The GW Research Showcase is just around the corner! The School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS) Research Showcase is at the University Student Center on April 25, 2024. This year’s Keynote Speaker, Omaida C. Velazquez, MD. will present “Gene-Modified MSCs and Direct Gene Therapy as Novel Strategies for Vascular Regeneration and Wound Healing.” The medical student poster session will be held from 1:30 pm to 3:30 pm.
While the deadline for submitting abstracts has passed, you may still be working on putting your poster together. Himmelfarb Library can help! Our GW Research Day Resources Guide has helpful resources and tips that can help make your poster stand out. The Creating Effective Posters page has poster templates, official GW logos, and the official GW Color palette to help you stay consistent with GW’s brand. If you are creating your poster using PowerPoint, the video below on Designing an Effective Poster Using PowerPoint has useful tips on size, color selection, font choices, and including graphs, charts, and photographs in your poster.
The Poster Design and Layout page also has great tips on selecting the right font, resizing images, and getting posters printed. When choosing fonts, it’s best to keep things simple and use familiar fonts like Times New Roman or Arial. Images should be 300 dpi JPEG files or full-size PDF files. If you need to resize an image, make sure that you keep the proper proportions so the image doesn’t appear distorted and “squishy” looking on your poster.
Once your poster is ready, it’s time to start thinking about how you’ll impress the judges. Here are some great videos that can help you prepare for giving your poster presentation:
The GW School of Public Health (GWSPH) Research Day was yesterday, April 9, 2024. If you participated in the GWSPH Research Day, don’t forget to submit your poster to Himmelfarb’s institutional repository, the Health Sciences Research Commons (HSRC). Archiving your poster in the HSRC is a great way to ensure that your poster is available to the global community of scholars! Archiving your work in the HSRC has several advantages:
Your poster will have a unique URL that you can include in your CV and use to promote your research. This unique URL will remain active even after you graduate from GW.
The HSRC is indexed in Google Scholar, which allows other researchers to find your work through Google Scholar searches.
Submitting your poster to the Health Sciences Research Commons is easy! Simply email hsrc@gwu.edu to submit your poster directly or to ask for more information.
“Summer Beauty” by Dana Bolsteins (2022 Art Show submission, photography)
Calling all artists! Do you have a painting, print, or photograph that you'd like to share? How about some needlework, pottery, or hand-made jewelry?
Himmelfarb Library is excited to announce its 2024 Annual Art Show, which will run from Monday, April 15th through Friday, May 10th. This event, now in its 36th year, is open to all students, faculty, and staff of the SMHS, GWSPH, and GW Nursing. Join us for an opening reception in the library on Monday, April 15th, from 4:00 pm - 5:30 pm.
Key Dates:
Submission Deadline: April 11, 2024 (Thursday)
Opening Reception: April 15, 2024 (Monday), 4:00pm - 5:30pm
Art Show Dates: April 15, 2024 (Monday) - May 10, 2024 (Friday)
We are accepting submissions through Thursday, April 11th. Please drop off your artwork at the first floor Circulation Desk. Digital copies of your work can be included in our Virtual Art Show, by sending the file(s) to himmelfarb@gwu.edu. You can submit exclusively to the Virtual Art Show if you prefer.
If you have questions or would like additional information, please contact us by email at himmelfarb@gwu.edu or by phone at (202) 994-2850.
If you need some inspiration, enjoy these submissions from previous years. Check out more prior submissions in the Himmelfarb Library Annual Art Show collections in the Health Sciences Research Commons!
“The Faerie Queen of New Prague” by Basil Considine (2023 submission)
After four years of medical school, the MD Class of 2024 has made it - it’s finally Match Day! Congratulations from all of us at Himmelfarb Library! We couldn’t be more proud of what you’ve accomplished during your time at GW. You faced some big challenges to make it here - you started medical school in the early days of a global pandemic! But you’ve adapted to the extra challenges and made it through!
Himmelfarb librarians and staff are proud to have played a role in your medical education by providing the textbooks, databases, journal articles, resources, and study space that helped you gain the knowledge that brought you to this day. Your Library Instructors watched you learn, grow, and gain confidence in your knowledge and abilities during the Clinical Integration Sessions of your first two years of medical school. We saw the pre- and post-exam highs and lows, and late nights and early mornings - and know you’ve worked hard to get to today. We are thrilled to have been part of your journey to becoming extraordinary physicians!
We encourage the GW community to tune in to watch Match Day festivities live! Even if you can’t join the celebration in person, you can watch from anywhere as students receive and open their letters to find out where they spend the next three to seven years of their residency training.
Here’s a flashback to Match Day 2018 at SMHS:
Congratulations MD Class of 2024! All of us at Himmelfarb Library wish you the best of luck in residency!
This Thursday, the Himmelfarb Library is proud to host a Basketball Toss event! This joint fundraiser will take place Thursday 3/14 from Noon to 4:00 pm. All proceeds will go to the GW Healing Clinic.
Methods of payment will be cash and VENMO. The VENMO link will be provided onsite.
Each paid participant will receive one free practice shot. We will be setting up a two-level scoring opportunity, with two different lines to toss from. The first line will be closest to the basket, generating two (2) points for each shot made. The second line, which will be further away from the basket, will generate three (3) points for each shot made.
Participants may start and leave the event without losing their score. In the event of a tie, there will be a showdown to determine the winner. The two tied participants will receive three (3) tosses from the second line. This will continue until a winner is determined. There will be only one winner!
The winner will be determined at the end of the event day. The player with the highest cumulative score will be the winner! The 1st place prize will be a $75 gift card to Tonic and will have bragging rights for an entire year! Other prizes will be presented to the 2nd and 3rd place winners.
At the end of January each year, the day arrives. International Holocaust Remembrance Day is observed this Saturday, January 27.
Memory and the act of commemoration are paramount in preventing history from repeating itself. International Holocaust Remembrance Day, also known as International Day in Memory of the Victims of the Holocaust, was established by the United Nations in November 2005. The day commemorates the killing, by the Nazi regime and its collaborators, of six million Jews and millions belonging to other populations. January 27 was the date chosen to commemorate this day because it was the date that the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration and extermination camps were liberated by Allied forces. Other countries also commemorate the Holocaust on different days.
You may have seen the 2022 Himmelfarb Library blog post commemorating this day, which covered doctors and the Holocaust, and another post from that year, which covered the Nazi Medical Research Dilemma. This year, we will focus on evidence that experiencing the trauma of the Holocaust induced genetic and epigenetic changes that are intergenerational. Epigenetics refers to “heritable changes in phenotype which do not involve alterations to the underlying DNA sequence” (Martin, 2014).
In a 2014 study, the first of its kind, blood samples were collected from 80 adult offspring with at least one Holocaust survivor parent. These blood samples were correlated with maternal and paternal PTSD in the parents (Yehuda et al., 2014). Findings showed that the glucocorticoid receptor gene GR-1F was altered, but in different ways, depending on whether the subjects experienced maternal or paternal PTSD. The findings of the study indicated that both maternal and paternal PTSD impact the stress response of offspring via the process of methylation, which is a first-line biochemical process that plays a critical role in the modification of DNA (Menezo et al., 2020).
Systematic review has also been applied to the topic of intergenerational trauma resulting from the Holocaust, Published in 2019, “Intergenerational consequences of the Holocaust on offspring mental health: a systematic review of associated factors and mechanisms”, reviewed 23 studies focused on the impact of the Holocaust on parent and child characteristics and interactions which were found to lead to the development of psychological symptoms, as well as biological and epigenetic variations (Dashorst et al., 2019).
Reviewing the evidence, the authors sought to examine: “association between parental and offspring’s mental health problems;” "perceived parenting and attachment;” “parental Holocaust history;” "additional stress and traumatic life events in Holocaust survivor offspring;” and “cortisol metabolism, epigenetic factors, and genetic predisposition” (Dashorst et al., 2019, pp. 22-23).
Assembling and reviewing this evidence, the authors suggest their findings indicate that, rather than pointing to direct observation of particular disorders in offspring, the impact of Holocaust trauma appears to result in diverse mental health problems that are influenced by characteristics of both the parents and the offspring, suggesting that treatment should be offered to both generations, as well as parenting support for traumatized parents raising children. Intergenerational effects were also found to impact cortisol levels, which regulate the body’s stress response. Holocaust survivor offspring were found to have increased vulnerability to stress.
Evidence related to Holocaust survivors and their offspring offers important guidance on biological mechanisms impacted by trauma, and on the diagnosis and treatment of, and support for, mental health conditions. However, new studies are more difficult to undertake as the generation that survived the Holocaust begins to die off.
Locally, this year’s commemoration of International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which coincides with a surge in antisemitism worldwide, will take place in DC at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum on Friday, January 26 and Saturday, January 27. Events open to the public include reading of victims’ names and the option to light a memorial candle. On Friday, January 26, between 2-3:45 p.m., Holocaust survivors will be present at the museum to engage visitors about their experiences.
Consider making a trip to the Museum this year to speak with a Holocaust survivor -- the opportunity will not last forever.
Holocaust literature is widely available at GW. This research guide from Gelman Library can help guide your exploration of our collections.
Also, consider joining GW’s SMHS Anti-Racism Coalition for its upcoming discussions of the book It Could Happen Here (available to read online through Himmelfarb Library), by Jonathan Greenblatt, head of the Anti-Defamation League. The ADL was founded in 1913 "to stop the defamation of the Jewish people, and to secure justice and fair treatment to all."
International Holocaust Remembrance Day offers us all an opportunity to reflect, to learn and to consider how we can all work to prevent the conditions that fostered a climate of hate to develop into the historical events that coined the word genocide.
References
Dashorst, P., Mooren, T. M., Kleber, R. J., de Jong, P. J., & Huntjens, R. J. C. (2019). Intergenerational consequences of the Holocaust on offspring mental health: A systematic review of associated factors and mechanisms. European journal of psychotraumatology, 10(1), 1654065. https://doi.org/10.1080/20008198.2019.1654065
Martin S. (2014). Journal Watch review of Influences of maternal and paternal PTSD on epigenetic regulation of the glucocorticoid receptor gene in Holocaust survivor offspring. Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, 62(6), 1101–1103. https://doi.org/10.1177/0003065114560792
Menezo, Y., Clement, P., Clement, A., & Elder, K. (2020). Methylation: An ineluctable biochemical and physiological process essential to the transmission of life. International journal of molecular sciences, 21(23), 9311. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijms21239311
Yehuda, R., Daskalakis, N. P., Lehrner, A., Desarnaud, F., Bader, H. N., Makotkine, I., Flory, J. D., Bierer, L. M., & Meaney, M. J. (2014). Influences of maternal and paternal PTSD on epigenetic regulation of the glucocorticoid receptor gene in Holocaust survivor offspring. The American journal of psychiatry, 171(8), 872–880. https://doi.org10.1176/appi.ajp.2014.13121571
As we reflect on the life, work, and impact that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. has had on our nation and the world, we are reminded that Dr. King was passionate about activism on racial discrimination, poverty, and health disparities. A great way to honor Dr. King’s legacy and continue his important work is to learn more about anti-racism, inequities, and disparities in healthcare and use this knowledge to help build a more inclusive healthcare system. Himmelfarb Library has some great resources that can help you learn more about these topics so you can put your knowledge into action!
Himmelfarb Resources:
Himmelfarb’s Anriracism in Healthcare Guide provides information and resources related to antiracism in healthcare including links to professional healthcare organizations centered around diversity and health justice issues, training resources, and links to GW-specific organizations. Browse the Journal Special Collections tab to find journal issues and health news on antiracism-related issues. Antiracism books and ebooks available at Himmelfarb are also included in this guide including:
In addition to the Antiracism in Healthcare Guide, Himmelfarb has a Diversity and Disparities in Health Care collection of books and e-books with nearly 200 books addressing issues of disparity and representation of minority communities in healthcare.
If you are interested in becoming more involved, consider reaching out to local student or professional organizations such as White Coats for Black Lives or the Antiracism Nursing Student Alliance. Involvement with these and similar organizations can help you put your knowledge into action and offer opportunities for collaboration in furthering the cause of finding solutions to healthcare disparities and opportunities to educate others on issues of health injustices.
The results of the 2023 Fall Colors Photo Contest are in! This event, sponsored by Healthy Living @ Himmelfarb, welcomed digital photo submissions of the beautiful fall foliage. Students, faculty, and staff affiliated with the GW School of Medicine and Health Sciences (SMHS), School of Public Health (GWSPH), and School of Nursing (Nursing) submitted their original photos taken in 2023. Judging was based on creativity, originality, and overall artistic impact.
So without further ado, this year's winner is Mehrshad Fahim Devin (SMHS student). Here’s Mehrshad’s photo, entitled “Fall Ride - Roof of the Kennedy Center”:
Himmelfarb Library would like to thank everyone who submitted a photo for this year’s contest! We loved seeing all of your great photos and getting to see fall through your beautiful pictures. You can view all of the photo submissions on Himmelfarb’s first floor, as well as online:
Fall is here! Head outdoors to admire the beautiful fall foliage around you and capture those amazing photos. Enter your best photo with a chance to win a PRIZE. All digital photos submitted will be showcased in the 2023 Himmelfarb Fall Colors Photo Gallery.
How to Enter and Contest Rules:
Photo submission dates: Monday, October 16, 2023 – Friday, November 3, 2023.
By submitting an entry, each contestant agrees to the rules of the contest.
Who Can Enter:
Staff or students affiliated with GW School of Medicine & Health Sciences, Milken Institute School of Public Health, and School of Nursing.
Judging:
Photo entries will be judged based on creativity, originality, and overall artistic impact. One winner will be chosen by select participants and members of the Healthy Living @ Himmelfarb Committee.
*Himmelfarb Library reserves the right to cancel the contest or modify rules at its discretion. Himmelfarb Library reserves the right to reject any entrant whose entry appears off-topic or violates the rules.
Our Annual Book Sale will be held from Tuesday, September 12th through the Friday, September 15th in Himmelfarb’s first floor reference alcove. The sale will be open from 8:00am to 8:00pm Tuesday to Thursday, and from 8:00am to Noon on Friday.
Textbooks, study guides, books of historical interest and more will be available - arrive early to see what we have to offer! Prices will be $4 for hardcover books, $2 for paperbacks. Card payments only. Contact us at himmelfarb@gwu.edu if you have any questions.
