Painting captures Karis' strength, joy despite cancer

NEWARK – One of the first and last things Marc Guthrie sees every day is a painting of his granddaughter, Karis Crosmer.

It hangs on the wall beside his front door, always there to greet him when he returns home. The painting always brings a smile to his face as he remembers the moment the two shared last winter.

The painting shows Karis, 3, looking out the window, watching her grandfather shovel snow outside her home. She was holding a miniature broom and tapping on the window saying, "Papa, I help, I help!"

"I was so touched when Josh (Karis' father) had his aunt take the picture," Guthrie said. "It was a special moment."

Since Karis was diagnosed with leukemia last September, moments like those have become ones the family treasures. Looking at the photograph, Guthrie thought of his friend, Linda Linham, a painter he had known for many years. He had been thinking of having her paint a portrait of Karis, but he decided to send her the photo of the winter scene instead.

He asked Linham, who now lives in Florida, to take a look at the photos and see if she could recreate it as a painting. She called him back to make sure that's really what he wanted, worried about painting Karis without her hair, whose hair had fallen out after her chemotherapy treatments.

Guthrie assured Linham that's what he wanted, to capture Karis as she was: A strong, happy young girl despite her cancer.

"I looked at what he sent and I knew I had to do something to bring her personality through," Linham said. "Marc had made the comment to me that she's always smiling even though she's going through this horrible thing, and I knew that was what I had to capture. She's sort of their personal hero for surviving all of this and I needed to show that."

So although Karis had her back facing the camera in the photograph, Linham was able to show her smile by painting a reflection in the window pane.

Linham had told Guthrie it would take six to eight weeks to finish as she had other projects she was working on, but she ended up working three days straight to complete it. She said she couldn't sleep, she just felt this drive to paint it.

She titled the painting "Papa's Helper" and made a trip to Newark to deliver it to Guthrie. When he saw the finished painting he was at a loss for words. Guthrie was so moved by the painting that it brought tears to his eyes, and all he could say was "I love it."

"I think, as a grandparent, you have a special bond with your grandkids, and when one of them is sick and going through something like this, it just rips your heart out," he said. "To have this, and to see it multiple times a day, it means a lot to me."

Linham was happy to be able to bring such joy into the family's life.

"Pieces like this mean so much more when it's somebody that you know, like Karis. It was a very emotional paintings for me," she said. "A painting really is a moment in time that then becomes something that will be there for eternity. I'm just thrilled that he liked it, and I think it accomplished what he wanted, which was to show that positive side of all of this."

emaddern@newarkadvocate.com

740-328-8513

Twitter: @emmaddern