'All in the Mind?': An Exhibition
“Brilliant! Utterly refreshing and free from pretension. All artists and everyone else should see this inspiring work and learn something.
I’m so glad I came.”
AUDIENCE COMMENT, ALL IN THE MIND?
'All in the Mind?', running for 9 months in 2017, was initiated by a group of young people who wanted to use photography and creative expression to highlight personal and political issues relating to mental health. Through the online and physical exhibition of their artwork, they wanted the opportunity to express themselves, engage in conversation and actively contribute towards positive change to mental health education throughout the city and beyond.
To begin with, the group met several times to experiment and learn about the role of creativity in mental health treatment. This included an Art Therapy session with Tyna Evans and a Typography session with Jono Lewarne.
Then, they each created work during a 'Making Period', which would be shared widely through Rising’s Instagram and at SPACE in Old Market.
After the exhibition, a call was put out online for other young people to contribute work to the collection. All the initial work and the work submitted in response is gathered below.
Work by the 'All in the Mind?' collective
First exhibited at SPACE (Old Market) on Friday 6th & Sunday 8th October 2017.
Anna Rathbone | Henry Garrett | Scarlett Smyth | Imogen Potter | Jay Carter-Coles | Charlie Osbourne | Gulliver Whitby | Vivian Barton
ANNA RATHBONE — 'PATHWAYS'
“Trying to find a way out of mental health problems involves a lot of running around in circles. You think you’ve got somewhere, then suddenly you’re back where you started. You get passed around from service to service and fall through the gaps in the system. It’s hard to know what direction you’re going in, or how you even got to this point in the first place.”
ANNA RATHBONE — 'ACTIVATED CHARCOAL'
Artwork by Anna Rathbone. Abstract work created with activated charcoal.
"Activated charcoal (oral suspension) is used by paramedics or A&E staff to treat poisoning or overdose. It’s like drinking paint.
Materials: Activated charcoal and chalk pastel on paper."
HENRY GARRETT, 'PROFOUND PIGEONS'
Artwork by Henry Garrett. An illustrated pigeon offers words of comfort.
"Profound Pigeons is a new project from the mind behind Adventures in Anthropomorphism (for The i Paper) and Drawings of Dogs. The pigeons were pasted around Brick Lane in London. The ubiquity, and adaptiveness, of pigeons in our cities makes them the perfect vessels for pithy snippets of advice."
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SCARLETT SMYTH — 'RHYTHMIC SCALES'
Artwork by Scarlett Smyth. A set of brass weighing scales.
Artwork by Scarlett Smyth. A collage featuring the image of unbalanced weighing scales.
'Charcoal varnishes the
scale of sagacity, A
hurricane of Fog chokes
my brain depriving sanity.
Taming the mental mane,
Forcing myself out of the black and into the blue again."
A piece challenging normality in relation to mental health, using literacy as a form of expression and inviting anonymous poetry from the public."
IMOGEN POTTER — 'YOU SO'
"Imogen is a recent Fine Art graduate from the University of the West of England. Her multi-disciplinary practice is an emotionally charged investigation into the process of creating tension. She manipulates predominantly industrial materials by removing them from their usual forms and settings."
Jay Carter-Coles – 'BOX'
Artwork by Jay Carter-Coles. Photos showing Carter-Coles' friend lying down, in pain.
Artwork by Charlie Osborne. Photos of family members.
"This is a series of images taken on film of my Grandad Terry and brother Tazrian focusing on their relationship. Even though very different they also share plenty of similarities and their relationship continues to bring me joy. My mental health is usually triggered by human interactions, for example, negative family situations. During low points, I like to document moments that are in front of me. Here I have decided to capture two positive male role models in my life just enjoying each other's company."
GULLIVER WHITBY — 'VIEWPOINT & TOUCH'
Artwork by Gulliver Whitby. Explorations of the body through self portraiture and illustration.
"my self-portraits explore ideas about connections and feelings of loneliness. i wanted to expose myself physically to mirror my emotional vulnerability. the drawn series also looks at duality, focussing on the complexities of my relationship with myself. I've found the journey of creating and sharing these artworks really cathartic."
Vivian Barton – 'Final 1'
"I am a transgender video/multimedia artist. I made a series of videos looking at dysphoria looking at different aspects of myself and rating how much I felt like they were my own. Recently I've been looking at all sorts of different ways of exploring issues of gender in creative ways."
AFTER THE EXHIBITION: SUBMISSIONS TO the 'All in the Mind?' collection
Submitted in response to the work exhibited by the 'All in the Mind?' collective.
Lydia Cooper | Megan Thomas | Annie Lilygreen | Olivia Lo | Ben Hartley | R.K. | Sophie Green | Charmaine Lam
Lydia Cooper – 'I'm Happy!'
Artwork by Lydia Cooper depicting a woman drinking tea from a mug that reads 'I'm Happy'
"I created this in my first year of university and I think it captures my feelings about how many students feel during university when they are battling with mental health - lots of tea and pretending you are happy.
This piece is 11.7 x 16.5inches and only acrylics were used."
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Megan Thomas – 'Child's Play'
Artwork by Megan Thomas. Abstract photography.
“A lot of my work centralises around mental health, drawing upon both my personal experiences and the political issues attached to such illnesses.‘Child’s Play’ isolates personal regimes from an autobiographical abstracted stance, rendering the intimacy and solitude in ‘mandatory’ tasks. The project highlights melancholic themes related to the silent moments during daily routines and how modern society dodges such personal reflection at length. The project uses both film and digital photography to document the integration of beauty within the everyday, focusing on its unconscious necessity."
Annie Lilygreen – 'Lost/Everything Is Fine'
“I made 'lost' as a response to my own experience with anxiety and general feelings of existential distress. 'EVERYTHING IS FINE' was made with the same kind of intent.”
OLIVIA LO — 'WHERE IS THE WAY OUT?'
Artwork by Olivia Lo. Abstract painting—two hands hold an open book.
"This is a painting about my former mental health state. This work presents the idea of the struggle I was facing in my social life. Sometimes I wanted to let people in, but a part of me kept rejecting the invitation of people. I kept pushing people away even though I knew that it would be beneficial to interact with people more often. The yellow square frame is a suggestion of a door frame or an exit; and the parallelogram next to the yellow frame is a suggestion of a door. The grey path seems to be a literal ‘way out’, and it may seem to be a paradoxical to the title of this work. However, this is the dilemma of my former mental health state that I want to present. I felt that I was trapped in a dark place where I did not know how to save myself."
BEN HARTLEY
“The video could be seen as both a piece of video artwork, and a therapy tool. I wanted to create something that can have a calming effect on the viewer and bring them (or myself) out of a manic episode or a period of extreme anxiety. The video and sound were recorded in Akureyri, Iceland.”
R.K.
Artwork by RK. Abstract work painted using poster paint and kitchen supplies.
"All were done with quite ordinary materials, such as poster paint (and some things you find on a kitchen shelf.)"
SOPHIE GREEN — 'FED UP'
Artwork by Sophie Green. Polaroids of the artist with tea ingredients scattered over them, including cardamom, seeds, nuts, and leaves.
"I've had difficulties on and off with my mental health for around the last 10 years, recently when I started to find things tough again I started to look into alternatives to medication, as well as trying to consider my lifestyle choices in more depth, which was the catalyst that brought about 'Fed-up'.
'Fed-up' is an exploration of the various benefits of simple ingredients (often used in tea) have on physical health, wellbeing and mental health, after I became disillusioned by many aspects of our current socio-cultural lifestyle, and modern day 'solutions' to poor lifestyle.”
CHARMAINE LAM — 'FREE YOURSELF'
Artwork by Charmaine Lam. An illustration of a person sat hunched in a cell, with the key beside them. A caption reads "Set yourself free"
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All in the Mind?' was funded by the Bristol City Council Creative Seed Fund.