Stress is a big factor that drives women to smoke. These days, females are expected to work full-time, take care of households, raise children, and still have time to be attentive wives. And don’t forget about single women, who still have to run households, possibly raise children, work, and pay all the bills themselves.

Factors that start teenage girls on the path to addictive smoking are impossible body standards and impossible academic demands. Girls see ridiculously thin actresses (known to have private eating disorders) portraying “real life.” Smoking can suppress the appetite to keep weight off. Unreasonable academic demands push teenage girls to relieve stress by smoking.

Finally, most forms of media (television, radio, newspapers, websites, and so on) do not promote smoking, but they no longer dissuade it, either. A number of years ago, there was a public media campaign that warned of the dangers of smoking. Today, a whole new crop of young women do not see concrete reasons NOT to smoke. This is an issue that needs to be publicly readdressed.

Studies have found that females have certain health risks when they smoke. Some of these risks are unique to women, and some are increased in females compared to males:
Women who smoke have an increased risk for developing cervical cancer
Female smokers have more complications with pregnancies, including lower infant birth weights and defects
Women who smoke and take birth control have an increased risk for strokes, heart attacks, and blood clots
Female smokers have an alarmingly younger age for a first heart attack compared to men who smoke: women who smoke have a first heart attack (on the average) at about age 66, compared to women who don’t smoke (81.) That’s a 14 year difference. For men, the difference is 6 years (age 72 for smokers compared to 64 for non-smokers.)

The spirits of the African diaspora continue to be a living and vibrant part of peoples lives. This show includes a blend traditional and modern interpretations of these spirit, their stories and ceremonies.

Artists include:
Tasha Menary
Monica Bodirsky
Xris Kukiel
Fleur McGregor
Kit Currie
Andrew McGregor
Lydia Knox
Ayoluwa Taylor
Rootwomin
Oshunguna

Opening Reception Thursday May 3rd, 7–9pm
Show runs May 3rd – June 7th.

Please share this invitation with folks you think would be interested. If you are interested in hearing about future calls to artists and shows please “like” The Hermit’s Lamp.

Curator and painter Santiago Ribeiro, in collaboration with painter Liba Ws have organized an international exhibit at Dorothy’s gallery in the center of Paris.

Artists from France, Portugal, Russia, United States, Czech Republic, Vietnam and Latvia are as following:
Andrei Nekrasov, Anne Ethuin, Benjamin Marques, Daniel Hanequand, Evgeny Denisov, Gregory Potosky, Isabel Meyrelles, Liba WS, Paula Rosa, Santiago Ribeiro, Serge Sunne, Shahla Rosa, Victor Lages, Vu Huyen Thuong, Yuri Shpakovsky And Yuri Tsvetaev.

During the course of the exhibit, the show will also present French surrealist painter and poet Bernard Ascal who will read poetry from his bestselling book on Aim? C?saire.

This show is testimony to the ever growing International movement of surrealists and visionary artists who express their universe through symbols both personal and sacred.

“Surrealism, which was born after the first world war, is characterized by its opposition to all social conventions, moral and logic. It is a movement immersed in dreams, instinct, desire, rebellion, and the liberty of life. It is also perhaps the movement most tied to imagination, a movement fully alive in the artistic and literary worlds. In Portugal, it is perhaps the link which ties these two worlds together. Prof. Perfecto Cuadrado said so aptly in one of his conferences: “The history of Surrealism, meaning anthologies, studies, catalogues (and exhibits) devoted to the so called International surrealism, needs to be divulged – the price, sometimes, in a simplified fight against other forms of simplification, when it is not against a total silence due to sectarianism, or ignorance whether French, Portuguese or International.” Surrealism through words, painting and sculpture continues, like life to be: insistent, concrete, daily and real. This exhibition in Paris, the birthplace of the movement, is proof that “International Surrealism” is still alive.”