Some know me as a Memory Artist
a Private Mythologist
a Creative Arts Practitioner
a Psychotherapist

But when we work together, really I’m happiest when you think of me as a trusted friend. Unlike many artists, my work begins when I set my ego aside as Nancy Gershman (the “this” or “that”) and listen to you tell your story. Whether it’s for celebration, legacy or healing – dreamscaping is entirely for your sake. Bring me your most precious memories, stories and epiphanies, and I’ll bring new meaning to your photos in ways that will transport you and open doors.

Who am I?

A third generation painter, only this time the canvas is digital. Lola, my Viennese grandmother was known for her Chopin and the hyper-realistic water droplets she could paint in oils. My father was a weekend painter whose style was more Fauvist, but whose day job was psychoanalyzing CEOs as a management consultant. His Socratic line of questioning undoubtedly got me started in my first career in advertising and market research, teasing “the truth” out of interview subjects. In my free time, I’d often cut and paste to keep my sanity. But it was only when I created a tender series of photo collages for my firstborn’s barmitzvah that I made the cognitive leap that celebration, legacy and healing are interlaced along the same timeline. In the absence of the “right photos” (that is, endearing shots of my eldest engaging with close family members or friends), I created these myself by cutting out family members from multiple photos and collaging them together into a single picture.

The result were photo collages that appeared to amplify the joy gained by the barmitzvah boy from being in another’s presence and essence. Using this method, I was able to reunite my son with his great-grandmother who would have been overjoyed by his piano playing that now mirrored her own.

That one perfect picture

When the dotcom bust came, I tipped my hat to the great conceptual art directors of Madison Avenue and said to myself: “Nancy, it’s time to teach yourself Photoshop.”  I became a master manipulator of photos and opened Art For Your Sake as a mecca for anyone seeking that one perfect picture.  Always, other people’s raw photos and especially their back stories just floored me. In shoe boxes and photo albums I’d see imagery that rivaled that of the MAGNUM photographers of the 30’s; images that the collage artists Jacques Prevert and Peter Beard would have killed for.  I realized then that what I wanted to do more than anything was to further explore how suspending one’s disbelief – and placing people, places and meaningful objects inside a photo – could promote happiness and healing.

Real life was my training ground

During my lifetime there have been mental health crises that shaped the kind of psychotherapist I am today. Multiple deaths taught me that baby steps in adulthood are applaudable. A relative’s bout with anorexia nervosa taught me what a fine line exists between dying happy and wrestling back control over one’s sanity.  The ever-looming spectre of my mother’s obsessive compulsive behaviors showed me we are all chemically-speaking, very mysterious organisms, requiring heaps of compassion from others and for one’s self.

When I created my first healing dreamscape, I’d never heard of resourcing,  narrative therapy, the imaginal experience or memory reconsolidation. But once I did, I recognized that I was an artist who enjoys problem-solving, the act of companioning, asking impossible questions, employing a dark sense of humor, and yes, cutting and pasting,

For those who seek meaning but cannot find it; for those who found meaning and can’t wait to gift it – it’s my privilege to work with you.

 – Nancy Gershman  (New York City)