Artist Statement
There is a hidden cost for living within a society marked by ever increasing technical innovation, urbanized complexity, and material wealth. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, approximately 20% of all Americans exhibit symptoms of psychological disorders and this prevalence is growing. Despite the commonality of these symptoms across society, historical and cultural stigmas have silenced the expression of the varieties of psychological experiences. My work visualizes the effects of psychological well-being and psychopathology across multiple levels of analysis – the individual, the family, and society – in an attempt to understand the ambiguous line between mental health and illness in all of us.
Psychological disorders are diagnoses of exclusion— abstract concepts used to categorize the uncategorizable. The purpose of my work is to visualize the human experience of emotion, including atypical psychological states and mental illness, to those whose concept is merely an abstraction. Photographic and video portrayals provide a dynamic and immersive environment for the viewer that captures the all-encompassing nature of psychological disorders. Artistic creation and expression has long been associated with the lived experience of marginalized and diverse individuals, with the visual arts able to go beyond the descriptive limitations of science and language in the portrayal of anxiety, depression, and psychosis. Through my work, I elicit a viewing experience that treads the border of order and chaos, portraying the complexity, intimacy, and vulnerability of atypical human experiences.
The use of alternative process, such as the tintype and ambrotype, conveys the historical nature of our concepts of psychological states— modern conceptions of psychological disorders developed concurrently with, and were influenced by, the refinement of early photographic processes in the mid 19th century. For example, pioneering photographers such as Hugh Welch Diamond used portrait photography to document the effects of treatment on mental disorders. Also, Charles Darwin used photographs of facial expressions in the first attempt to categorize human emotion in his The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872). In my latest work, I utilize the handcrafted and fragile nature of these older photographic processes to represent the complexity and unpredictability that accompanies our emotional lives.
My most recent video piece, “Balloons in the Backseat,” depicts the cyclic emergence, intensification, and ultimate destruction that characterizes familial madness. Told from the point of view of a mother and a child, Balloons in the Backseat depicts the psychological breakdown of the mother, and the child’s fear of turning into the parent. The piece touches on issues of depression, suicide, and anxiety, while weaving in themes such as loss of innocence and self-preservation. This work represents the fragility of a child’s psychological capacity to withstand the chaos and trauma of the toxic domesticity that often accompanies parental mental illness. The ocean, which draws people such as the mother to its edge, in a subconscious, almost hypnotic manner, serves as a destination for the seeking of pleasure or the removal of traumatic pain. The child, never sure of her mother’s intentions, can only watch with the hope that her mother is going for a swim and not for a funeral.