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COVINGTON, Ky. — An art exhibit in northern Kentucky is showing people how one woman channeled her fear from a life-changing diagnosis. Her motivation to complete a daunting health journey, combined with her longing for home, are on full display.

Krista Sheneman is an artist. She’s a southerner at heart. She’s a type-2 diabetic. Most recently, she’s an avid walker. The intersection of these things might be difficult to recognize, if it weren’t for Sheneman’s interactive exhibit, which also doubles as an AirBNB, at Pique Gallery in Covington.

It’s the third step in a series called “Walking Home.”

“About five or six years ago, I was diagnosed in Cincinnati,” Sheneman said of her diabetes. “It kind of spiraled for a bit. Because that’s a pretty life altering diagnosis. I didn’t know what it meant. I didn’t know what I needed to do.”

Doctors, friends and family helped her get a grip on her health.

Sheneman completes her 470-mile walk in Memphis, Tennessee. (Krista Sheneman)

She started thinking about her creative process, and how, to her, being a successful artist means the art needs to be integrated into daily life.

A plan started coming together, she said.

“I, as an artist, document my existence through health, collection and memory,” she said.

The first step of “Walking Home” was her preparing her body.

A year of training included eight hours a day on a treadmill, which Sheneman calls an “Art Mill,” and is now part of the exhibit. She asks guests to get on and scan a code to take a survey for collecting data.

Then came research. She started talking to people, asking about how identity and home are interwoven within human beings.

It culminated in her walking 470 miles in 23 days from her undergraduate alma mater in Cincinnati to her childhood home in Memphis, Tennessee.

Everywhere she stayed along the way, captured in polaroids, everything she collected, even the walk itself and what she wore, are all part of her artistic vision. The stroller she pushed and the safety vest she wore, for example, served both a practical purpose and are part of the exhibit.

“The stroller seemed a very easy choice for me to carry all of my belongings,” she said.

Handwritten itineraries featuring her glucose levels from each day of the walk form a chart on one of the gallery walls, showing the heavy toll the journey took.

“At the end here, it gets a little crazy. The lines start to get a little higher and lower,” Sheneman said. “Things got weird on that walk. It was a bizarre time to ask a lot of my body.”

Along with her health, the walk was inspired by Sheneman trying to understand the pull she was feeling toward her childhood home.

“I haven’t lived there in many years, but as soon as someone talks about the south, I am right there with them,” she said.

A letter to her childhood home, which hangs in one room of the exhibit, captures some of those feelings. Sheneman encourages her guests to write their own letters. The room also features some of her childhood pictures, and even a piece of wallpaper her mother had preserved.

Dexcom CGMs helped Sheneman and her loved ones track her glucose levels during her walk. (Spectrum News 1/Sam Knef)

Of all the items on display, the Dexcom CGMs she wore during the walk, which allowed her and her loved ones to track her glucose levels, are perhaps what most tie these ideas together.

“I feel like this is the most intimate object that I dealt with on my walk. And I also feel like this was the thing that made the walk possible,” Sheneman said.

If all of this makes sense, or even if none of it does, Sheneman said she’d welcome anyone to come check out, and discuss with her what is still a work in progress.

“I think I’m gonna be exploring this for the rest of my life,” she said.

The gallery runs through July 27. Anyone interested in making an appointment can do so through Sheneman’s website.