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Brian Chhor is a senior majoring in Human Biology. His interests include regenerative medicine, biodesign, the medical humanities, and integrative healing. He tries to be a lot of things—a bad dancer, an even worse singer, a retired speed-cuber, and an artist who still paints the sun at the corner of the page. A picky eater and an even snobbier smeller, Brian is obsessed with the details no one else cares about. Ask and he will gladly bequeath his unique observations through oddly mixed metaphors and gauchely descriptive images. Raised in a donut shop, Brian is no stranger to the subtle charm of everyday life. He spent most of his childhood caught between the elegant science of baking and the smattering of textures, feelings, and aromas that makes cooking art. He eventually hopes to work in global humanitarian surgery, but we’ll see how that goes.

Brian Chhor

Scents of Drying Tears

"When we see, we remain what we are; but when we smell, we are overtaken by otherness."

Our olfactory bulbs are intricately linked with the parts of our brains that control memory formation and emotional processing. They have the powerful ability to transform and cement what we feel at the deepest level, recording our experiences with more detail than our other senses are able to. Primitive but potent, aromas transport us to different times and places in our lives. They help us remember and define who we are by allowing us to relive the testimonies of who we have been.

Scents of Drying Tears is a series of ink drawings and a sculptural triptych that explores the different stages of grief and coping: anger & denial, depression & bargaining, and acceptance & transformation. Each set of hands presents a uniquely designed fragrance that accentuates the essence of each stage. The scents serve as a guiding thread as you progress from one sculpture to the next—aromatic curators for the gallery of different emotions.

While incredibly painful, the process of grieving and coping with loss often leads to deep growth and transformation. Through this personal struggle, we catch a glimpse of the stark, simple beauty that is life. We all walk through this spiritual and emotional journey along different paths—through overwhelming grief, deep contrition, and unspeakable love. And it is here that we each find our own sense of truth. There's an unfathomable sacredness in this primal tradition and there's a depth of understanding that speaks more eloquently than a thousand tongues can begin to conceive. In the midst of death, we become the most connected to life.

Introduction

She sits upright in the bed—placid, sedated. Her expressionless face looks sallow but soft. Her eyes are fixed and her pupils dilated. She has the timeless eyes of a statue. Her body neither stirs nor responds to outside stimulation. She can’t hear us. She can’t see us. No feeling. Brain decomposition has already begun.

There is no electrical function in her brain and her essence has completely dissipated; her propensity for long, warm embraces and those recipes for peach sweet tea have been reabsorbed by necrotic tissue. The doctors call it brain death. At any other point in history, this would have been death in its simplest form. But not now; now she still looks like my Nana.

A strange cocktail of intravenous drugs and adrenaline keeps her blood pressure stable and her heart beating normally—a fake elixir of life, keeping her just alive enough to serve as a coping mechanism for the rest of us. A large, incomprehensible machine inflates and deflates her lungs—trying to replicate the very breaths I heard as a child. I nestle my ear against her sternum and try to listen for the butterflies in her stomach, just like I used to do as a kid; as if our secret ritual has the power to wake her from this slumber. It’s been a while, but these breaths are not the same. Forced, painful, they are poor replicas, almost mockeries—cold, emotionless, perfunctory.

Nana is gone. Why am I still here?

Armed with a plethora of cutting-edge, intensive procedures, doctors have more power than ever before to blur the lines of life and death. Modern advances in technology have not only increased our lifespan, but also completely redefined what it means to be alive. Our ability to understand and manipulate physiology has birthed machines that can breath for us and medications that can bleed for us. With new innovations in regenerative medicine, some scientists think that we can escape death completely. But where do we draw the line? What psychosocial consequences will these advances have; how will they affect how we approach life altogether? At what point does extending life become prolonging death?

Despite having these more effective biomedical tools, most healthcare providers believe that there is a way to “die well,” one that allows terminal patients to live out their last few days with dignity, love, and comfort. People who are on the front lines of medicine are often the strongest advocates for more humane ways of dying, acknowledging the beauty and the necessity of grief. While incredibly painful, the process of grieving and coping with loss often leads to deep growth and transformation. Through this personal struggle, we catch a glimpse of the stark, simple beauty that is life. It propels us to live life more fully and to appreciate the time we have left with those we love.

Shadowing in the intensive care unit, I saw scenes clipped from nightmares. Patients were strewn up by needles and tubes, permanently hooked up to expensive machines; parasites, sucking out their blood and nutrients only to pump them back through brittle vessels, purified. Helpless, hopeless, they were violated, rendered into bags of atrophying flesh. The idyllic scenes of loved ones locked in compassionate, truthful embrace never came on screen. Instead, there were only giant computer closets inhabited by feeble, dying patients; they were taking up space, unable to move or communicate, but clearly in pain.

Occasionally, I would see patients break—unfathomable remorse welled up in their eyes as the windows glassed over in bitter resignation. Every time, it was a profound, tragic moment of deep regret and hopeless repentance, wishing they had said goodbye when they had the chance. Every time, they leave defeated and broken, realizing the beautiful death they had hoped for had long passed.

Personal Significance

The struggle and consternation darted back and forth across her eyes, trying, desperately searching for any last piece of advice—something I could remember her by.

I gently placed my hand on her shoulder to let her know that I heard and understood, that I would never forget. She relaxed, turning to the televisionin contented resignation.

Silence—beautiful emptiness.

As I got up to leave the room, she grabbed my hand and held on until shecouldn’t support the weight of her arm anymore—feeble, wrinkled, cold. She squeezed, as tightly as she could, to feel the warmth of my palm—a part of her, manifested in me. It was evidence of her memory and legacy.

She was also passing to me all of the blessings and prayers she could conceive. A lifetime of beliefs, lessons, aspirations, and fears, transferred in one smooth hand gesture—an unspoken conversation in the most primal of languages. I could hear the dwindling flame in her voice. Tired, satisfied—she deserved the rest.

She gently swung my hand back and forth, like she was rocking me in her arms again. A thank you, an I love you—a goodbye. No words could have been enough.

This project is my way of paying homage to my grandmother, who passed away the summer of my sophomore year. I was thoroughly unprepared to deal with her illness, and later, her death. I wasn’t sure how to react, since she was the first person to pass away that I was truly close to, and it impacted and shaped me more profoundly than I could have anticipated. It led to a yearlong reevaluation of what I was searching for in my education and in life, challenging my motivations and reasons for being at Stanford, and ultimately, forcing me to redefine who I was
and who I wanted to become.

At nineteen years old, I became the sounding board for my grandmother’s fears about dying, helping her come to terms with what she was leaving behind. I would leave halfway through lectures to talk about the plasticky green beans they served with every meal, the doctors’ callous disregard for her winces when starting intravenous lines, and the dehumanizing language barrier that prevented her from communicating with doctors and nurses. She allowed me to venture into the depths of her emotional and spiritual search for closure and contentment—a rich, fulfilling experience that I’m forever grateful for. Together, we caught a glimpse of the “good death.”

Methods and Materials

Ars Moriendi: Liberation Through Being

Ars Moriendi is the overarching project, an interpretive, multimedia installation that explores the idea of the “good death.” While the patient’s perspective is incredibly different from those of their loved ones, each wonderfully rich and individually meaningful, this project seeks to explore the intersection of those experiences. Death and illness are sticky—they don’t just affect the dying person or those around them, but instead challenges everyone involved to find their own sense of healing and peace.

This project will invite audience members into the sacred transitional space that terminal patients and their loved ones inhabit, drawing from a variety of artistic and cultural influences to invoke a greater depth of understanding. It will stimulate a discussion of what the dying process entails and invite the audience to reframe their perspectives on the nature of life and death. Ideally, it would allow patients and their loved ones to leave with a sense of peace and hope, demonstrating the beauty and simplicity that can be achieved.

The larger installment series exploring themes of religion and faith at the end of life, the nature of medical science innovation, and various emotional, mental, and spiritual factors that contribute to a “good death.”

Scents of Drying Tears

Scents of Drying Tears is one part of the larger installation, specifically exploring the canonical “five stages of grief” by Kübler-Ross. This piece is a sculptural triptych that explores the different stages through plaster-cast hands and perfume-infused salts that, combined, accentuate the essence of each stage. They are also accompanied by selected ink drawings that inspired and informed the final installation, ranging from studies of hands to portraits of patients.

The triptych is comprised of three sculptures corresponding to the stages: anger & denial, depression & bargaining, and acceptance & transformation. Each set of hands presents a uniquely designed fragrance that accentuates the essence of each stage. The scents serve as a guiding thread as you progress from one sculpture to the next—aromatic curators for the gallery of different emotions.

The scents are infused in bone-white epsom salts—pure, detoxifying, and necessary for life. They are presented on a simple, black votive dish; tears collected from each stage of grief, still imprinted with the dense emotional intensity, left to dry and escape into the ether.

Anger & Denial

The most volatile and intense of the three pieces, the hands depict an emotionally charged mourning of loss. A hand feebly reaches through an amorphous block of plaster, as if extending from another realm to touch the grieving figure. The ring finger is broken off at the knuckle (proximal metacarpophalangeal joint) where a wedding ring would normally sit, to represent the loss and the death of something or someone loved. The other hand desperately claws into the air, grasping to hold onto the lost artifact in futile disillusion.

The fragrance is equally jarring—a combination of antiseptic lavender (Lavender “Mailette,” Lavandula augustifolia, South Africa); woody, earthy, religiously ceremonial green spikenard (Nardistachys jatamansi, Nepal); and the exotic heat of Choya Loban (India), a pungent Indian spice. The overall impression lingers with the unmistakable feeling of illness—of old, exotic spices you would expect from a bazaar or a nursing home, combined with the soapy, sterility of hospital bedpans. The disinfection is infused with various ritualistic tones—earthy, primal—and ends with the sharp, fuming turmoil of overgrown campfires. The uneasiness of illness fades into the peppery flames but indelibly marks the overall experience, a phantom reminder of loss and of hopeless denial.

Depression & Bargaining

Markedly more pleasant and hopeful than the first piece, these sculpted hands are gently reaching into the air—trying to reconnect with a lost reverie and, at the same time, beginning to release the anger and despair. The most complex and, to some, the most beautiful of the three pieces, this sculpture captures the emotional and spiritual struggle of actually letting go of the anguish. Considered by many to be the most challenging and canonical stage of grieving, Depression & Bargaining presents a bittersweet resting point along the journey for healing.

Aptly named Bittersweet, this fragrance is considerably more pleasant but is equally complex, when compared to its predecessor. The main notes are a combination of tea rose, fig, and concentrated cocoa—reminiscent of an elderly woman’s dresser. The dominating tones are honeyed and bright, but old-fashioned, the nostalgic feeling of burying your face into your grandmother’s perfumed dress—pleasant and familiar, but not cloyingly sweet. As the floral notes begin to settle, a deeper richness darkens the overall feel with a slight bitterness. The memory of your grandmother fades and you become fixated on the grittier undertones. The disenchanted reminiscence fades as you helplessly accept the fleeting recourse.
This is the most complex and emotionally enriching of the three fragrances.

Acceptance & Transformation

The last sculpture depicts cupped hands, both receiving and pouring back love. Placid, serene, there’s no longer an active search for closure or healing—there is just the passive collection and giving of what is. By accepting the loss and allowing it to transform your perspective, you are able to fully appreciate the beauty that comes from coping with death and to give more to those you love. This fragrance is bodiless, drawn from aether and purified water. It is pleasant but not sweet—light, pure, cleansing. While the previous scent was honeyed and floral, still bursting with vegetation and life, this fragrance is the next phase: ascendance. A combination of water tones, aloe, and cucumber, this fragrance epitomizes the weightless simplicity and serenity of acceptance—ethereal and beautiful.

Discussion and Conclusion

The Scents and the Tears

Our olfactory bulbs are intricately linked with the parts of our brains that control memory formation and emotional processing. They have the powerful ability to transform and cement what we feel at the deepest level, recording our experiences with more detail than our other senses are able to. Primitive but potent, aromas transport us to different times and places in our lives. They help us remember and define who we are by allowing us to relive the testimonies of who we have been.
While incredibly painful, the process of grieving and coping with loss often leads to deep growth and transformation. Through this personal struggle, we catch a glimpse of the stark, simple beauty that is life. We all walk through this spiritual and emotional journey along different paths—through overwhelming grief, deep contrition, and unspeakable love. And it is here that we each find our own sense of truth. There's an unfathomable sacredness in this primal tradition and there's a depth of understanding that speaks more eloquently than a thousand tongues can begin to conceive. In the midst of death, we become the most connected to life.

The Young Artist

I was raised in a donut shop. Unusually sensitive to different emotional and sensational stimuli, I learned early on how to appreciate the beauty and simplicity of everyday life. I can still remember sitting on a milk crate in front of the donut display case, sketching on napkins and paper lunch sacks. I only had three colors to choose from—an assortment of red, black, and blue pens that customers forgot or didn’t want, emblazoned with random company logos and advertisements for small businesses. But that didn’t stop me from making sloppy portraits for friends and customers.

I was only four years old at the time but I can still smell the soft creaminess of French crullers, hiding underneath the bright kick of buttermilk cake donuts. Oh, the beautiful clash of sensations, the delicious grittiness of life. I was bombarded with so many different, beautiful impressions; so many different feelings I wanted to create and share with the world.

My relationship with art has been a long and meaningful one, though sporadic at best. Growing up from humble roots, it was hard to justify exploring art and my creative expression, so I often put it behind my academic pursuits. Every once in a while, though, I would go back to reconnect with my creative self and it was a beautiful, emotionally enriching experience every time. It’s just one that I don’t often get to retreat to. However, with the support of incredible friends and mentors, I’m working to weave these different parts of myself into a better, more synergistic balance.

The not-quite-as-young-but-still-young artist

I am currently a senior majoring in Human Biology. During my time at Stanford, I’ve explored three main academic interests: biodesign & bioengineering, medical humanities, and public service & social entrepreneurism. Tying those together is my core sense of being—a combination of emotional ties to friends and family, my internal creative expression, and my spiritual & religious exploration.

The bulk of my academic training has been in biological design and engineering, with a particular focus on regenerative medicine. I’ve dabbled in mechanical design and the design thinking process, but in general, I’ve been trying to root myself in stem cell technology and its medical applications. However, between drug design courses and lectures on biomaterial scaffolds, I managed to sneak in several medical humanities courses as well. They helped me to understand why I was pursuing medicine and how I could help patients from an emotional, psychological, and spiritual perspective. For the first time, I could creatively express my passion for medicine and science through my art through short stories, pen and ink sketches, charcoal drawings, and watercolor. And that exploration led me to The Senior Reflection class, to develop further under the tutelage of different artistic mentors and Sue & Andrew.

This project has been a way for me to reflect on my Stanford experience and tie together a lot of what I’ve done—manifested in an artistic, emotional, spiritual installation. These past four years at Stanford have been incredibly challenging but enriching—from discovering my passions and idiosyncratic inner workings; to coping with the loss of my grandmother and rocky familial relations; to meeting some of the most caring, interesting, and intelligent people in my life. Through these experiences, I have become the man that four-year-old boy only dreamed he could be. This is a small recollection of that journey.

References

1. Lisa Fong, perfumer, Artemesia. For teaching me how to blend fragrances and generously supplying rare and valuable essential oils for my experimentation and personal use.

2. Yosh Han, perfumer, Eau de YOSH. For coaching me through the aromatic arts, helping me finalize the three fragrances, and teaching me to feel the scents through Zee Avi albums and painful memories.

3. Jeremiah Barber, MFA, artist and lecturer at Stanford University. For helping me tie the project together at the last minute and get the installation up.

4. Nancy Hillis, MD, sculptor, painter and psychotherapist. For helping me brainstorm and refining my ideas at the beginning of the year.

5. Santiago Ibarra and Peter Abraham, roommates. For staying up with me to finish the pieces, letting me experiment with casting their hands, and helping me pull everything together at the last minute.
6. Will Eleazer and Joey Lopez, friends. For letting me cast their hands for the pieces and helping me stay on track.

7. TSR Workshop Peers, homies. For helping me refine my vision, constantly providing constructive feedback and support, and letting me experience a small part of their world through their art.

8. Sue McConnell and Andrew Todhunter, professors of awesomeness. For their incredible guidance, unprescriptively prescriptive advice, and their incredibly nurturing encouragement. Thank you for giving me this opportunity to finally bridge my passion for medicine and science with my love of art.

9. Grandma, my number one fan. For always being there for me when I doubted myself, for teaching me how to love and showing me what is worth living for, and for consistently being my greatest source of encouragement and inspiration. I love you more than I can ever express.