Małgorzata Dawidek’s youth in communist Poland and experience of living with a long-term health condition have crucially shaped her interest in art, history and medicine. Her cross-disciplinary practice combines performance, photography and text, by which she can survey the relationships between critical states of the human body and discursive language. She searches for visual and linguistic representations of the body’s afflictive experience, vulnerability, anxiety, pain and loss, and the ways of soothing in the context of the politics of identity. Reviewing the canons of art and literature, Małgorzata asks: “How can we create through bodily and mental crises whilst avoiding myths, clichés and emotional blackmail? Can art be made through an experience of empathy and care? She examines these issues by collaborating with researchers and volunteers, including groups of patients (Holding Patterns) and interacting with nature (Diagnoses and Reconstructions).