This is the end of my life, but it is not the end of my love. It is not the end of the story.
- Eva Markvoort
When Eva Markvoort agreed to open up her life through the documentary 65_RedRoses, the result was a powerful message of life, love, and hope. By doing so, she started a global campaign for organ donation and CF awareness.
While waiting for a second transplant on March 27, 2010, at the age of 25, Eva’s breath ran out. But her vision did not die. Canadian distributor Hello Cool World is working with the filmmakers and Eva’s family to spearhead a North American campaign.
To date, the award-winning film has screened at numerous international festivals and been televised in a dozen countries. It was chosen for OWN Documentary Club in the US. Eva believed that after seeing her film and witnessing her struggle with cystic fibrosis, people would finally understand the importance of supporting CF research and awareness, as well as be inspired to become an organ donor.
Our Mission
Our mission is to spread Eva’s campaign for organ donation and CF awareness far and wide! The only funding we have for our outreach campaign is coming through sales of our #4Eva materials or from your generous donations.
At only 23, struggling with cystic fibrosis, Eva started blogging on LiveJournal as she waited on the list for a double lung transplant. After her transplant, Eva and then medical student and photographer Cyrus McEachern, collaborated on an image for a heart-themed photo contest his cardiology professor was hosting. These stunning images, born from Eva’s artwork (with herself as the canvas) and Cyrus’ photos, are the heart of our campaign.Through her story and her art, Eva’s campaign continues, #4Eva. (Which means forever in Twitterverse!)
This first photo series also inspired a further collaboration with BC Transplant commissioning the pair to do a “Live Life. Pass it On” photo series – Eva with her lungs, and other transplant recipients with the organs they had received painted on their bodies. We also collaborated with BC Transplant to create their 2012 Live Life Pass It On PSA using footage from the film.
Cyrus on Photographing Eva
by Cyrus McEachern
I’ve been known to change hobbies and interests almost as frequently as my underwear, but photography’s been a favourite of mine for the past few years. I made the switch from point-and-shoots to an SLR about 3 years ago, took an intro to photoshop class at a community college, and have spent thousands of hours toying on photoshop since. In my first year of medical school, one of the cardiology professors hosted an annual heart-themed photo contest titled ‘Heartfelt images’.
One of my ideas was to do a portrait and overlay an x-ray of a heart over the chest. I had gotten to know Eva over some lunches at UBC and I knew she liked photography and modelling, so I asked her to be my model – she enthusiastically obliged. When she showed up to my place she realized she had her face-paints in her car, and we figured we could use them somehow. Without much of an idea of what we were doing (it was my first-ever portrait shoot), Eva painted a heart on her chest in the mirror with an image from google as her guide. I took hundreds of photos that afternoon, but the one with her arms over her head stood out to me like none other. I stayed up all night editing it, and came up with the image that has been featured in many newspapers, magazines, and of course Eva’s blog.
We were so happy with how it turned out that we did a series of images in the same style: organ transplant recipients with their new organs painted on their bodies (including Eva and her second pair of lungs). These images also turned out very well, and are going to be used in an ad campaign by BC Transplant, aimed at recruiting as many new organ donors as possible. This whole experience has given me hope that I can combine my love of photography and training as a physician to create a unique career in which I can make large-scale changes in health care issues through art. That is my dream.
peace and love,
~cy