https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/from-the-desk-of-the-pink-gene-project daily 0.75 2026-09-23 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/from-the-desk-of-the-pink-gene-project/c22mur8ivki0u0bx65drzb2f62v9ei monthly 0.5 2026-09-20 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/from-the-desk-of-the-pink-gene-project/4uu3omr7aoou95yy375voatnzzb54a monthly 0.5 2026-09-20 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/home daily 1.0 2026-09-12 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/dace453e-8714-43b1-8f6f-ea42069e6518/Painted+Blackbird+Logo_FINAL.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/0dba8ca8-ffdb-474c-9770-b382966ae4f9/Heart.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/2cc597fa-a771-4408-9795-8c2e8c452315/IMG_7048.JPG https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/83c7f317-9b61-46cd-b91b-c25a783f1630/658918726_1364377019058652_6684972333525956249_n.jpg https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/83a7b9d2-0378-44d5-950d-950df88f7a88/LaGrange.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/b559d2cd-8436-41fb-b6d2-e4b8eb4a2885/Ann+Looking+for.png https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/1780618931.17092-HBPEIZSSHWPRPOFKBTXL/imgg-gg3p-BCHRZ-143dc7e3.png https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/about daily 0.75 2026-09-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/a4c12b03-4d8e-4ddb-b709-964953fcd359/A4AE1F15-56F5-49E0-B12E-853054C18333_SnapseedCopy.PNG https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/contact daily 0.75 2026-09-21 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/c14ae5f4-07d3-4bb5-ad76-ea9a47aad073/C11FA0A0-AE0A-4F9E-9579-550D84085D2A.png https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/gallery-2-1 daily 0.75 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/b89d4419-9702-4307-b8e5-e7daf0a08a72/593F2F8C-52ED-4C28-A871-A13EDCBEB226.png The Pink Gene Project Title: Origin Story 48 by 60 inches Mixed Media on Canvas Prints available upon request This painting is where The Pink Gene Project began. At first glance, it is a simple female symbol interrupted by a navy medical cross. But that interruption is intentional. The female symbol represents every woman who enters the healthcare system seeking answers. The navy cross represents medicine itself. Its power to heal, but also its power to define, delay, dismiss, or validate our experiences. As I navigated my own journey with autoimmune disease, I realized my story wasn’t unique. I met countless women whose symptoms were minimized, attributed to anxiety or stress, or left unexplained for years before receiving an accurate diagnosis. This painting became the question that sparked The Pink Gene Project: What happens when a woman’s voice enters the medical system? Every portrait in the project grew from that question. This piece is not the conclusion. It is the beginning. I also love the visual metaphor that the medical cross sits directly over the center of the female symbol. It doesn’t erase womanhood, it occupies it. For many women with chronic illness, interactions with the healthcare system become intertwined with identity. That idea feels like the perfect first chapter for The Pink Gene Project. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/85edc86e-4aad-4ce7-b672-966c716fc058/2.1+She.png The Pink Gene Project She 36 by 48 inches Mixed Media on Canvas Prints Available She examines what it means to exist within the medical system as a woman. The deep blue fields are not simply a background, they represent the medical system itself. They press inward on the body, suggesting the weight of diagnosis, expectation, and the struggle to be believed. Look closely, and the blue reveals countless X marks embedded beneath the surface. They suggest crossed-out voices, dismissed symptoms, unanswered questions, and the invisible marks left by years of searching for answers. The body is intentionally clinical, presented almost as an anatomical form rather than a portrait. She has no face because she is not one woman. She is every woman who has ever sat on an exam table, searching for answers, fighting to be believed, or reduced to a collection of symptoms instead of being seen as a whole person. At the center, layered pink marks become the emotional heart of the work. It’s a place where biology, pain, and lived experience converge. They speak to the complexity of women’s health and the resilience required to navigate a system that does not always see the person behind the diagnosis. She is the beginning of The Pink Gene Project, inviting viewers to ask not only what medicine sees, but what it overlooks. It challenges us to recognize the humanity that exists beyond the chart, the test results, and the diagnosis. Every woman deserves to be seen, heard, and believed. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/75c2f61e-2d79-4ca2-8179-52edebfd6fd3/6+Triptych+.JPG The Pink Gene Project Triptych Title: Containment 18 by 24 inches Mixed Media on Canvas 1 of 3 in Triptych Prints available upon request Containment represents the space where truth becomes trapped inside the body. The composition suggests a throat, chest, and heart, not as anatomy, but as the emotional landscape of women living with illness that was questioned, minimized, or ignored. A vein of gold rises through the throat. Gold symbolizes truth: something precious, undeniable, and deeply human. Yet here it cannot escape. It catches in the throat, suspended between the heart that knows and the voice that struggles to be heard. The muted blue grays evoke silence and exhaustion, while the faint blush of pink reflects the legacy of being labeled anxious, stressed, or psychosomatic before receiving an accurate diagnosis. The body becomes a vessel of containment, carrying stories that medicine was not yet willing to hear. As part of The Pink Gene Project, Containment honors the countless women who learned to swallow their symptoms, soften their voices, and question their own reality because they were taught that their truth was not enough. It is a portrait of what happens when truth is forced inward and a reminder that what is contained is never erased. Title: Endurance 18 by 24 inches Mixed Media on Canvas 2 of 3 in Tryptic Prints available upon request Endurance speaks to the quiet strength required to live in a body that continues to carry more than it should. The composition suggests the neck, shoulder, back and spine, with a dark vertical line running through the center like an internal axis. It is both a spine that refuses to collapse and the invisible weight of illness that travels through the body each day. Flecks of pink emerge along this path, echoing the experiences of women whose symptoms were dismissed as anxiety, stress, or psychosomatic before they were believed. The surrounding white space is intentional. It is not emptiness, but resilience, the space where hope, healing, and identity persist despite pain. The dark edges press inward, suggesting the constant pressures of chronic illness, while the body remains upright. As part of The Pink Gene Project, Endurance honors the countless women who continue to move forward without applause or recognition. It is a portrait of survival, not because the burden is light, but because they have learned to carry it. Title: Repair 18 by 24 inches Mixed Media on Canvas 3 of 3 in Triptych Prints available upon request Repair explores what it means to carry illness inside a body that looks quiet from the outside. The soft gray blue form suggests a stomach and abdomen. At its center, the belly button anchors the piece in the physical body, reminding us that this is not an abstract landscape, but a human one. Layers of translucent paint mimic tissue, memory, and time, while the dark edges create the feeling of being enclosed, as though the body itself has become a vessel holding pain, treatment, and endurance. The scattered pink marks represent the traces medicine leaves behind. They echo injection sites, procedures, medications, and the invisible evidence of living with chronic illness. Small in scale, they are easy to overlook, much like the daily realities of those who carry disease beneath the surface. There is no dramatic gesture here. Instead, the painting speaks in whispers. It asks viewers to consider the quiet labor of repair, fear, hope, and resilience within a body that continues to move through the world. In Repair, the body becomes both a refuge and a prison, holding everything together while revealing almost nothing at first glance. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/e8925b8f-9aaf-4ff8-88a8-a78e19dd3074/7+Do+No+Harm.JPG The Pink Gene Project Do No Harm 36 by 48 inches Mixed Media on Canvas Prints available upon request Do No Harm confronts the space between the promise of medicine and the reality of being a patient. Prescription slips become fragments of a medical system: orders, diagnoses, referrals, screenings, medications, case management. But across them, the language becomes personal: fatigue, dismissal, disbelief, pain, care, symptoms, “I was important,” “I was not heard.” The layers are intentionally chaotic. Pink, turquoise, gold, black and white collide the way information can collide inside a complicated medical journey. Words are written over words, partially erased and buried beneath paint, reflecting how easily a patient’s voice can become obscured by paperwork, protocols and assumptions. The prescription papers represent treatment, but they also represent authority. They ask: Who gets believed? Who gets heard? Who gets treated as a whole person rather than a case? At its center is the contradiction of the title. “Do No Harm” is not only a medical principle. It is a question. What happens when harm comes not from a lack of treatment, but from not listening, not believing, or not looking deeply enough? This work is about the patient who keeps showing up… asking to be seen, asking to be heard, and asking for care that does no harm. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/37145907-544e-4c51-a25c-ba48e459d2d4/IMG_3565+%282%29.jpeg The Pink Gene Project The Pink Gene 48 by 48 inches Digital Cardboard Photos on Wooden Panel The Pink Gene is a portrait installation that explores the intersection of gender, chronic illness, and medical bias. It brings together one hundred passport style portraits of women living with autoimmune disease, arranged in a grid that reflects both medical documentation and scientific research. Rather than highlighting individual identities, the work asks viewers to consider the collective weight of shared experience. The portraits are divided into two groups. Black and white portraits represent women diagnosed with autoimmune disease. Portraits tinted pink represent women who, before receiving an accurate diagnosis, were told their symptoms were anxiety, stress, or psychosomatic. Pink becomes more than a color. It is a symbol of the ways women have historically been dismissed, misunderstood, and disbelieved within healthcare. One of the most meaningful parts of this project is that these women are strangers. They did not grow up together, belong to the same support group, or know one another before participating. They found this project through random social media connections and chose to trust a stranger with their photograph and, often, their story. They come from different countries, cultures, races, professions, ages, and backgrounds. The only thing connecting them is autoimmune disease and, for many, the experience of having their symptoms dismissed before receiving appropriate medical care. That matters. When women who have never met, who have nothing else in common, continue to tell the same story, it stops looking like coincidence. It begins to reveal a pattern. By removing names, biographies, and personal narratives, the installation shifts the focus away from individual stories and toward the larger system that connects them. Each portrait is intentionally simple. Together, they become something much larger than one person's experience. Viewed individually, these are portraits of strangers. Viewed together, they become evidence. The Pink Gene Project is not about offering answers. It is about making visible what has too often remained invisible. It asks who is believed, whose pain is considered credible, and what happens when hundreds of unrelated women tell remarkably similar stories. The installation transforms isolation into solidarity and private experiences into a public record, inviting viewers to see that behind every face is not only a person, but a pattern that can no longer be ignored. https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/f277ee87-663c-4cd7-8d82-e20f8c6d835f/IMG_3601.JPG The Pink Gene Project Stop! ASAP 12 by 12 inches framed For many women living with autoimmune disease, the first diagnosis is not a diagnosis at all. It is Anxiety, Stress, and Psychosomatic. These are often the words women hear before anyone looks deeper, before the blood work, before the scans, before the referrals, and before someone finally believes them. The title Stop It! A.S.A.P. carries two meanings. It speaks to the urgency women feel as their bodies continue to change while they search for answers. At the same time, it reflects the message so many women receive from family, friends, and even medical professionals: stop worrying, stop crying, stop overthinking, stop making such a big deal out of it, stop imagining things. As if illness were a choice. The women in these portraits are strangers. They found this project through random social media connections and have never met. They come from different countries, cultures, races, professions, and generations. Their lives are entirely different, yet they share two experiences. They live with autoimmune disease, and many were first told their symptoms were caused by Anxiety, Stress, and Psychosomatic before receiving an accurate diagnosis. This work was created as a companion piece to The Pink Gene, giving meaning to its color language. In The Pink Gene, the black and white portraits represent women living with autoimmune disease. The pink portraits represent the women who were first labeled A.S.A.P. before their illnesses were recognized. The pink is not about femininity. It represents dismissal. It marks the space between becoming sick and finally being believed. Standing in front of The Pink Gene, viewers are not simply looking at one hundred portraits. They are looking at a pattern. One woman being told her symptoms are anxiety can be dismissed as an unfortunate experience. One hundred strangers telling the same story cannot. Together, these works ask a simple question: What if the pink was never the disease? What if the pink represented the diagnosis women were given before anyone looked for the real one? https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/ann-smith-curriculum-vitae daily 0.75 2026-09-24 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop daily 0.75 2026-09-22 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/botanicals monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/hearts monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/landscapes monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/0khschh4fpv8hfjm6ba5g78wd2pa57 monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/60dad1cc-4cb8-4088-bef4-15e4d925ac6f/IMG_3835.JPG Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 4 - IMG_3835.JPG https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/1d1c3a7a-d631-454e-8252-aa045003572d/Frame.jpg Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 4 - Frame.jpg https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/z32jnmsng66m34ly45eskhdd53jlwk monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/98d7adb1-57cd-4dcf-b552-bff2170d75bb/IMG_3834+%281%29.JPG Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 3 - IMG_3834 (1).JPG https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/d9ffe4e2-b450-4037-961f-76ef47f0c2ad/Frame.jpg Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 3 - Frame.jpg https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/product-3-szb2y-gzh2r-tzhkx-b6hhj-de3m5 monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/60a2a4dd-b158-4e17-a366-1b995d309bdf/9CF5D7EA-C9DF-450B-9D09-61A44F4518BD.png Explore Available Art - The Stone Remembers - 9CF5D7EA-C9DF-450B-9D09-61A44F4518BD.png https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/product-5-f98ry-4ll53-cageg-cxhs5-t5epc monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/2bffc3c3-93eb-4384-a573-eb522e56132e/IMG_3797.JPG Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 2 - IMG_3797.JPG https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/73c0a922-7567-4a14-b529-b58c891b36ab/Frame.jpg Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 2 - Frame.jpg https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/product-4-9e76d-pr6ls-ddx8r-2y3l7-y554b monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/8395cc0d-2ea5-40bf-9038-567f5a600c4d/IMG_0012.JPG Explore Available Art - A Quiet Truth - IMG_0012.JPG https://www.thepaintedblackbirdart.com/shop/p/product-2-5c6mb-j8mng-zsl73-srtpj-45gk9 monthly 0.5 2026-09-23 https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/e71538ae-3533-40c9-928d-2c5a774eeec1/IMG_3795.JPG Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 1 - IMG_3795.JPG https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/6aa4ae52c1dbb87ff3ce6c40/0ae2cc64-32bf-4ac9-86b5-b6738a142793/Frame.jpg Explore Available Art - Chaotic Blooms 1 - Frame.jpg