Inside Madness: Painted Words

(2008-2012)

 

Painted stories of people who suffer from mental Illness.

 

 

“I awoke in a small white room, devoid of any windows or furniture and with padded walls.  I was totally disorientated and couldn’t think where I was.  A strong fluorescent light shone down on me. I looked down at myself. I was dressed in a paper nightdress.”

-p.122, Scarred, by Sophia Laguna

 

 

    My studio walls scream and shout words from these stories. These walls would be bare without the inspirational literature which is the catalyst for this research. My personal connection with this topic involves significant relationships with people who suffer from mental illness; however the importance of this research is universal.  

     When creating these artworks, although many of them deal with sad, angry and violent themes, often and almost always, there are as many good, safe and quiet themes which counter the bad ones.  Everyone needs a safe haven whether it be in their mind or a real physical place.

     My intention in the creation of these art works is to use the universal language of art to increase people’s awareness through the presentation of strong emotive and expressive paintings.

     These paintings have their origin in poetry/ non-fiction and fiction. I emphasize mark-making and the use of thick intuitive strokes, to express these subjects and their journeys narrated in the inspirational writings. Robert Frost said “Every poem begins with a lump in your throat”. The stories which I choose to paint must embrace this attitude.

  

        “He dripped, splattered and swept the paint, like the untamable forces he wished to depict. In this somber, dramatic work…. He arrived at the freest way of painting he was ever to achieve, even in his later development." 

-Egill Jacobsen, Danish artist