The Invisibility Project, now an official nonprofit organization in the United States (https://theinvisibilityproject.org), was born as an inevitable byproduct of Leigh Witherell's journey as an artist and a bereaved mother.

Her daughter Amanda Jane passed tragically in a car accident in 2021. It was grief that ripped Leigh's heart open to fully pursue her creative career as she relied on art as an outlet and friend. In the artist's words, "Art is a companion that silently encourages me to show my inner self on the canvas."

Beyond serving as a cathartic tool, creating has led Leigh back to her roots as an educator, one that empathizes deeply with her audience.

"When I show my work, I get a wonderful opportunity to share the depth of heartache with openness and extreme vulnerability."

In communicating her reality, she has met fellow bereaved parents who have expressed gratitude for a tangible expression of their pain.

"I learned that many parents feel the same feelings. It's comforting not to feel alone in this odd place- Where you can feel rage, fury, sadness, devastation, elation, joy, and happiness all before noon on any given day. From those conversations, I knew I needed to work to bring visibility to our grief. We need a community that truly understands us, and that is when the Invisibility Project was born as a nonprofit organization."

The first order of business was to call other grieving parents to share their stories bravely. During the months of March and April, volunteer recorded interviews were conducted to research and document the commonalities and differences in the wake of losing a child. Twenty interviews with parents from multiple countries around the world left no questions about the main need of this suffering group- they feel neglected. Nobody wants to talk about their children's death. They need to talk about it and their children's names to be spoken. The artist had promised the research participants that she would share their stories with the world. Thus, Leigh took the recordings to Portugal and created the piece "We Are the Story " during a month-long art residency.

"Portugal provided me with a way to focus on the painting and the emotions behind it fully. We had interviewed the parents, and I had done the sketches, so now it was time to paint. This part was, by far, the toughest element of this project." 

Translating this massive amount of shared pain was not easy. The weight of her grief and the collective feeling of neglect at times crushed the artist. It was especially challenging for Leigh to create the figure of the screaming woman. 

"She represents the fury we all feel and also the helplessness. We feel helpless because we couldn't protect our children against death and are furious that death robbed us of our children's future. This part took the longest to complete as it was a stop-and-go process due to the overwhelming force of the image."



In honor of Amanda, the participating parents, and their children, the completed piece and eighteen other artworks will begin their tour under the exhibition Grief Flows, opening in Espacio Cómplices in Madrid on September 23 of this year. 

This exhibition holds no glamour but deep, inescapable pain that demands room to exist within the many other intrinsicalities and complexities that correspond to the human experience. The artist adds a warning- The raw subject matter of this show makes it difficult for people to view, and I understand that. However, for those of us who are living this nightmare and cannot wake up, it is something that we want the world to see. We don't want to be hidden by society; we don't want sympathy. We want acknowledgement that our children existed and were important and that our pain is valid and needs to be heard."