Images from artist Vanessa Michalak’s “The Nurse Project” will be on display at the Sargent House Museum’s gallery, Friday - Sunday, 12pm - 4pm through the month of August.

Ten large-scale images from The Nurse Project will be shown, five at a time, in the consecutive three-week exhibits at the gallery, which is open on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday from noon to 4 pm. Admission is $5 or free as part of a tour of the Sargent House. The exhibit is also free for students and Sargent House Museum members.

The Nurse Project is a salute to the heroic efforts of nurses during the Covid-19 pandemic by Vanessa Michalak, a Gloucester artist and graduate of the School of the Museum of Fine Arts who also holds a degree in nursing. Conceived as a collaboration between the artist and individual nurses, the exhibit includes a printed statement by each nurse.

“The project works to recognize each individual in a way that only portraiture can. The size of each painting is intentional,” says Michalak in an artist's statement. “Each portrait is a monument to our profession."

Being a nurse, like being an artist, she says, “is deeply rooted in identity. It is more than just a job." With The Nurse Project, she hopes to bring attention to a profession “where individuals often feel unheard, their concerns, intelligence and instincts sidelined.”

Michalak’s work has earned dozens of awards and has been included in numerous exhibits in the Greater Boston area and beyond. Her work has been seen locally in a creative outdoor show in Gloucester’s Dogtown, and she has been an artist in residence at Rocky Neck Art Colony.

Michalak would like to thank the Manship Artist Residency and Studios for its support of the The Nurse Project.