By Kristin Gorski, Director of Operations, and Anna Charles, Operations Manager-Smith Learning Theater

In February 2025, many community members interacted with the exhibit “Pricks and Pills”, created by Anna Charles, in the DFI Gallery on Russell Hall’s fifth floor at Teachers College, Columbia University. How did the artist develop this health-education interactive experience, and who does Anna hope to reach with it? This conversation reveals some insights. The following are selected excerpts from an interview conducted over Zoom on February 17, 2025. Excerpts have been edited for length and clarity.

Choosing the exhibit topic

Kristin: Can you describe the topic of your exhibit?

Anna: The topic is diabetes. In my exhibit, my main focus is talking to people from the African-American Caribbean community. I grew up in that community, and there's a lot of shame when it comes to this disease, especially within my community. I've met a lot of people in my lifetime who are diabetics, but they just won't talk about it. They're not fully educated on how to talk about it, how to manage or maintain their disease, or they don't want to share with their families because of fear of judgment.

Diabetes is a hush thing in my community. I didn't want it to be a hush situation where everyone was just quiet about their situation. I want it to be where it's an open conversation, where there's no shame involved. Where there's no blaming or saying, oh, it's your fault; If you ate better, you wouldn't be a diabetic. I didn't want that. So I wanted this exhibit to be an open conversation where we talked about our journey through it.

Extending multimedia art skills

Kristin: You recently earned your MFA degree. Can you tell me a bit about your degree program and what it’s about?

Anna: The program is called Integrated Media Arts. A lot of my focus was on video production and photography, with a mixture of video production, still photography, and audio production. This was my focus when it came to a lot of projects that I produced for school. I graduated with my master's degree in June 2024.

Kristin: So it seems like the focus of your MFA project was to get this exhibit completed,  which is a major milestone for an artist. And this is a personal story that you're telling. What inspired you to create this exhibition format?

Anna: Growing up, I've always loved going to museums and looking at artwork, appreciating pieces that were visually compelling and also had audio pieces behind them. I've always wanted to try to do something in that way.

What really inspired me was the fact that I just wanted to tell other people's stories that I've met along the way with the same condition I had [diabetes]. So I wanted to use my way of expressing this as a way to just give them a platform to talk, just to have a conversation on this topic.

Developing the media-creation and exhibit process

Kristin: Can you tell me a little bit about your process in designing the exhibit and making the choices that you did around different multimedia? What tools do you use, like cameras and related software, and how do these choices influence your content and your work?

Anna: In my projects, I like to go with a minimalist approach. I carry one camera with me with the audio recorder and then just film and record from there. I'm a firm believer that with recording the storytelling, that doesn't have to be a whole production: It can be something as simple as one camera and a recorder.

And that's exactly how I did the project. I brought my digital camera with me, and I brought my little tiny recorder, and I just recorded the conversation and took a few photos. One camera, one person. I say to the person I’m interviewing: Let's just sit down and have a conversation. And I feel like it's much more intimate that way, it allows people to just open up and say, okay, I feel free. I feel comfortable. 

Establishing rapport with featured people in the exhibit

Kristin: That leads me to my next question. How do you help people that you're interviewing and photographing feel comfortable with sharing their stories to be recorded? How do you create that environment and that trust where they can open up to you?

Anna: I do this in a safe space. For instance, I’ll record them in their homes, or I have them come and meet me at my home or somewhere where it feels really warm and comfortable, where they're not surrounded by a room full of people. Another key aspect: Because a lot of my projects are personal projects where I've lived through it myself, I share my own personal story with people. They start to realize, oh, I'm not going through this alone.

And so that's a conversation starter: Let me tell you what I've experienced first, and then I tell them you're allowed to share whatever you want to share, however you want to share it. I realized that a lot of people open up more once I share my story and my personal journey, also. I think it's all about you, as the artist, being vulnerable yourself and allowing people to come into your world.

Realizing and welcoming the audience

Kristin: You've explained that an educational focus of media is best to reach people about different topics in multiple ways. Who is your main audience for this exhibit?

Anna: Everyone. When I say everyone, I literally mean everyone because diabetes doesn't discriminate when it comes to who it touches. There are kids with diabetes, newborn babies who are diagnosed with diabetes. There are senior citizens who are diabetics. There are people who are my age in their 30s with diabetes.

Learning from shared stories

Anna: I think that it's best to have the conversation with a young child to teach them that it's okay to be a diabetic and you can live a long life with diabetes. So as long as you maintain it and manage it, you should live a long life. It's not a death sentence.

As a diabetic, no one understands that when you say, hey, I don't feel good today.

They just say, oh, please you're fine. But there's more to just a physical appearance when it comes to disability. There's other internal things that go on with us. So it is somewhat of a disability also, with all the symptoms that we experience. So I'm hoping that through this exhibit, people can understand that this is what diabetics go through.

On a daily basis, the exhibit videos share what people with diabetes think about, what they feel like they have to eat every day. From all the things that we talk about in the conversations that I have in the exhibit pieces, I want people to just learn from a diabetic directly and also understand the language that we use, and how harmful the lack of understanding can be for someone who is diabetic, who's walking around feeling ashamed just for being a diabetic. 

While the exhibit concluded on February 28, 2025, you can visit the “Pricks and Pills” website to learn more. In addition, DFI is currently working on a video recap of both the exhibit and the artist’s talk. Perspectives will publish an additional post with this new media and other relevant follow-up when it is available.