Olivia DelGandio (she/her) is a socially engaged artist, writer, and educator based in Portland, Oregon. Her work manifests in various forms, including a queer newspaper, memory-based installations, and intergenerational collaborations. Within this work lies a desire to document daily life, to collect memories, to be cognizant of ever-changing bodies and relationships, and to talk candidly about it all. She received a BA in Sociology and Gender Studies from New College of Florida and an MFA in Art + Social Practice from Portland State University. She recently developed and taught the course Queer Art: History and Practice, was an artist-in-residence at Sou'Wester Arts Week, and exhibited her work, Queerness is a Portal, at the MK Gallery in Portland, OR.

The Social Practice Artist Residency of Keene (SPAR(K)) was established in 2022 by Craig Stockwell. Olivia DelGandio was invited to be the artist-in-residence at Covenant Senior Living during the month of October 2024. She made an archive of hands, objects, and stories focusing on questions like: How do we evolve? How do our conceptions of life change as we get older? What do we want to be remembered for when we’re gone? This collection of photos was made to represent, celebrate, and share the meaningful lives and stories of the elders of our communities; a population that is often left out of the story. The accompanying publication explores the process of doing a project like this: the ephemera, the questions, the trials and errors, and all the ways we learned from each other.

Special thanks to the core participants of the project: Polly French, Carl Jacobs, Emma Stamas, Barbara Summers, and Craig Stockwell.