THANATOPSIS: A Meditation on Grief, Death, and Transformation’
On View: December 4, 2025 - February 14, 2026
Opening Reception: Thursday, December 4, 2025, 5-8pm Artist Talk: Saturday, February 14, 2026, 6-7pm, moderated by Jo Brickman
Paragon Arts Gallery at PCC Cascade campus, 815 N Killingsworth St, Portland, OR 97217. Free and open to the public. ADA accessible.

THANATOPSIS is a premiere art exhibition conceived by Marne Lucas, in collaboration with artists Shelley Chamberlin and Dardinelle Troen, that explores the end of life, the grief that accompanies death, and conceptually addresses impermanence and transformation beyond the physical form. Death is a taboo subject, yet we all eventually arrive there. The aim is to allow for the tangible feelings, the vastness of empty space, the sparse moments of sublime beauty in these difficult places, and honor the memory of those who have died. Death is a natural part of the cycle of life, and each individual’s work places aesthetic, emotional, and philosophical value on this inevitable transition. These three artists have found community in each other through their lived experiences with grief, loss, and transformation. They share the desire to illuminate and connect through their creativity, and find new direction in unexpected transformational paths. The audience can share their own experiences and stories in community, where together we heal.
The exhibition is accompanied by a series of artistic and somatic workshops held at Paragon Arts gallery at the PCC Cascade campus, to stimulate community conversations on end of life care planning, death and dying, grief, loss, and personal transformation. The university campus setting supports the aim and ethos of the content of this work, fostering deeper connection among citizens as they contemplate mortality in a safe space. Workshops included a death meditation, yoga for grief relief, a legacy collage workshop, and a write-your-own obituary workshop. End-of-life care advocacy materials were made available throughout the duration of the exhibition. As both Marne and Dardinelle are also end of life doulas and have collaborated on arts programming, they engaged their doula communities to guide programming.

My Transmundane series is an ongoing lens-based “artveillance” practice that conceptualizes the awe inspiring, invisible, fragile energy of humanity using heat-sensitive infrared thermal (IRT) video. Exploring the body and the metaphysical to pose philosophical ideas on transformation, a professional life as an end of life Doula (EOLD) provides insight. “Being at the veil” is to bear witness to physical, emotional, and spiritual transformations of life’s ebb and flow, into a new form of energy, Love.
Thermography technology, most associated with surveillance culture, allows the viewer to witness breathtaking invisible heat signatures (hot areas appear white, and cold or wet areas are black), and expresses ideas about our beginnings as being part of the universe, that we are beings of light. To witness our own energy is to accept the temporality of existence, and the magic of the transmundane- that which lies in the celestial and beyond.
The ceramic tiles are from the ‘Transmundane’ series of imagery applied as decals to glazed vitreous porcelain, then text is engraved onto the surface. The imagery is sourced from my IRT experimental short films, and the porcelain tiles were made at an Arts/Industry residency (Pottery Division) at the Kohler Co. factory in Sheboygan, Wisconsin.

Support for development of this exhibition was provided by The Ford Family Foundation, and the Oregon Arts Commission, Marne Lucas 2025/26 Career Opportunity Grant.
Special thanks to Zeinab Saab, Paragon Arts gallery director and artist, for their advocacy and support.
Special thanks to the PCC student gallery assistants Andrew, Brian, and Julian, for their professionalism and engagement.
Gratitude for Monograph Bookwerks for in kind donations of fine art books for the collage workshops.
Contact: Marne Lucas for inquiries, sales, and exhibition opportunities.