Donna Wensink (Hospital Programs Manager)

How long have you been working at FFHA? It will be 10 years in September 2021.

What do you do at FFHA? My title is Hospital Programs Manager so my main responsibility is donating artwork to care facilities all over the world.  I work closely with our corporate sponsors to meet their requirements as to the type of facility to which they would like to donate, the area of the country or a specific facility.  This gives me an opportunity to identify a facility and to focus in navigating their specific process to obtain approval to accept an artwork donation.  In addition to my main responsibility, I also get to be a problem solver, providing skills from my 20+ years of corporate IT experience implementing technology solutions.

What is your favorite form of creative expression? I’m pretty left-brained so I don’t consider myself creative at all.

What is your favorite part of your job? It definitely has to be seeing photos of teams painting our artwork and “thank you”s from hospitals who have received artwork donations.

What is your favorite part of our mission? Knowing that our artwork will bring a smile to someone who is possibly facing their deepest challenge being treated at a hospital.

Which of our paint colors are you? Why? Whispering Turquoise   Deep down I’m actually a shy person who likes to work “behind the scenes” without getting noticed.

What type of mural would you like to see added to our collection? It’s well known amongst my co-workers that I would like to see a mural with Westies (West Highland White Terriers) in colorful sweaters.  You see Westies being all white wouldn’t be very interesting to paint since you would mostly be painting with white paint but putting them in colorful sweaters would be a cute idea (or at least I think so).  This would especially meaningful to me as I’ve had several Westies over the years – currently I am “owned” by Carly who is almost nine years old and extremely spoiled.

If you could do anything at all, what would it be? End all suffering and disease.

What is something that you like to do during your time away from the studio? Prior to 2020, I would have to say traveling to someplace warm with a beach.  I’m not sure what traveling will look like in the future.  During the past few months, I have enjoyed cooking and learning more about orchid growing.