ARTISTS TALKING

# 11 [10 June 2010]

I've been wrestling a little with the question of the body and interactivity over the past few days. It seems that the classic case of interactivity in art practice using new technology encourages the viewer outside of their body to achieve some kind of merging with a group of other participants or the external depiction of their body and it's function. Classic examples could be something like Rafael Lozano Hemmer's piece for the 2007 Venice Biennale  http://www.lozano-hemmer.com/frequency_and_volume..... Although this piece draws the viewer's attention toward their body by its depiction in shadow and frequency, I would argue that this experience is ultimately externalising and deals in a superficial surface level interactivity. I think what I like about George Khut's Thinking Through the Body project is that it uses methods of body therapy to draw the viewer/user toward their own internal experience, heightening their awareness of their own body and it's functions. This is still an experience of 'interacting' with the art work, but is also a way of becoming more body aware, more internalised and more centered from a different perspective.

Sid Volter sent me a link to this  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ej9nchHoZkU&feature... piece by Laura Colmenares Guerra. It sparked an interesting conversation where I argued that I felt the piece focused on augmenting the viewer to a more externalised state where they are engaged in interpreting information from outside of the body, rather than focusing on drawing the viewer inward toward their own physical experience. Sid came back with a pretty intelligent argument about how in fact the piece potentially does both. I'm hoping he won't mind me quoting him:

"The Guerra video was biofeedback as it was supposed to make you more aware of your breathing and rhythm, and with the group make some kind of group symbiosis. Was it worth the feeling of having a mask / goggles strapped onto you? How effective it was I don't know.

I suppose the idea of biofeedback, like the thinking-body group, is to use what is already there and work with it - rather than setting-upon things and demanding things & in false situations like technology tends to do - that's when the separation happens."

I think this is a really interesting point. The biorhythm of the viewer's body (breathing) being used both to make the viewer more aware of their own body and to also integrate them with a group. I'd argue that the integration and 'symbiosis' that the piece seeks to encourage/demand is actually something quite unachievable and goes against conditioned social behavior norms for groups of strangers positioned together in a darkened room (sounds a bit cynical doesn't it??). However I do think that the breath could be key as a means of centering and internalizing the bodily experience and I say this more from the position of someone who practices regular yoga than as a spectator for interactive art!!

I'm keen to draw out some of this thinking for the conference at the Bluecoat in December. At the moment I have an idea for a programming strand looking at "New Body Therapies" which I think as a title in itself has it's own power in the context of a conference on aging!!  Lets see......

# 12 [13 June 2010]

How delightful to be Andrew Bryant's choice blog! What a pity that it coincides with my website appearing to have a complete neurotic breakdown and disappear from view all together...... lets hope by Monday morning my designers can restore it to full health!

Andrew has brought up a couple of really interesting questions and in my eagerness I will think them through now (in a rudimental way) and maybe return to them in more detail later. 

To Andrew's flagging of the polarity between 'outside' and 'inside,' I would also add 'pubic' and 'private' as related concepts. Both sets of polarities refer to a tension between what is projected outwards and is taken by society as useful, acceptable and of inherent value and that which is marginalised or deemed insignificant. The lovely, wondrous Jeanette Winterson speaks at length not only about the intimate healing power of art, but also about it's vital role in healing and sustaining an individual's inner life.

 "If you believe, as I do, that life has an inside as well as an outside, you will accept that the inner life needs nourishment too. If the inner life is not supported and sustained, then there is nothing between us and the daily repetition of what Wordsworth called ‘getting and spending.’"   http://www.jeanettewinterson.com/pages/journalism_...

That curating should act as a devise for augmenting the inner life and bringing it's discourses toward a more public forum is not something I had previously considered (obvious as it may seem when I think about it now). Curating equals making public but also acts as a tool of validation for the artists who are 'curated'. By curating around the topic of mental illness I offer to augment it's discourse into the realms of public recognition and acceptance.

Before I get far to excited about this....most of the artists who I am thinking of inviting for the show are all established in some way and are in the process of successfully pursuing artistic careers. Often (as in the case of Kim Noble or Hans Bernhard) they find themselves interrupted by mental illness midway through a successful career where they already have permission to make their inner life public (esp Kim Noble!). It seems then, that there is an ethical question to be considered around which artists the curator validates toward a public forum and those that she ignores and therefore permits ongoing marginalistation. The mentally ill are a marginalised underclass who often collect on the edges of society and to glamorise the issue by only selecting established artists who already have a voice might be conceived as misrepresenting the core issues around mental health.  I imagine that this might be the kind of argument that Andrew is moving toward when he says

"art never has the good or bad fortune to be tested in the world."

# 13 [18 June 2010]

I need to find a better phrase than 'mental ill health'. In my previous post I discussed what it might mean to group together artworks created by persons with 'mental health issues' and how this might serve to give a voice to a marginalised group. In response Sid Volter has emailed me to point out that in fact this might serve only to homogenise groups of artists in an unproductive way.

"You could argue that by curating a show on mental illness with people showing work that is all bound together under that header, you are picking out a specific quality. Like calling it 'depression' in the first place sort of objectifies it. I would be worried about being identified with such a show, if I were seen as 'a depressed artist' or 'an artist who makes work on depression' because it's singling out a part of myself for no reason! It's all me!

What is 'the mentally ill?' What is the 'marginalised underclass?' Would I want to be grouped under that header? All people under that category would be judged on similar ground using the same frame of reference. What if I don't want to be judged on similar ground? It's important from a societal point-of-view to voice things that aren't said, or talked about. I also know the importance of groups to help understand and identify the problem. I liked your interesting comments on validating and questioning standards of acceptance. But you see the problem when trying to group together into one concept. More interesting, I would suggest, is the idea of curating something that focuses more on the variance of individuality rather than the category itself."

I think in response to these points I need to make clear how I see the difference between curating a show of successful artists who language their own experiences around 'mental ill health' through their practice and curating a show of artworks by individuals who have no previous training as artists and whose 'mental health' problems have contributed to their becoming socially or economically marginalised. Although I am concerned with the former rather than the latter, I feel a great imperative that  this show should not glamorize or deal carelessly with conditions that can be chronically disabling for some people. Its a statistical fact that a high percentage of people with 'mental health' issues in the UK are from the economic migrant community or from disadvantaged backgrounds. I'm pretty sure that they are not marginalized purely because they have mental health issues, but because of a number of social and economic triggers. I won't be dealing with this issue as part of this exhibition, but it's important to me that I consider the social and economic background as part of the show's evolution.

However I emphatically accept Sid's assertion that 'mentally ill' is a too blunt phrase which draws all subtlety out of a complex psychological subject. It strikes me that 'mental ill health' belongs to the language of policy makers and pharmaceutical companies and is conducive to reductive arguments that see people as groups rather than individuals.

Better that this show should deal with the complex issue of individual psychologies rather than groups who have 'illnesses' and in a way I think that this is what art is for: expressing experience from a personalised perspective.

# 14 [19 June 2010]

I suspect I will return to the discussion covered in my previous post many times during the course of this blog. Its important for me that the arts do not yield too readily to the language of abstraction, while ignoring the socio-economic back drop against which they rest. However its also really important to me that the arts should avoid didacticism or over simplification and should have the courage to challenge existing assumptions or social norms. Part of the curatorial task of this show is to strike the right balance of both understanding and challenging our existing perceptions of 'metal health.'

Anyway my previous few entries have been very wordy and I've been thinking that it would probably be a relief for everyone if we have some new pictures to look at and a new artist to think about!!

I've been intending to mention a film by Harun Farocki called Immersion http://www.farocki-film.de/immerseg.htm for a little while now, having stumbled across it twice in the past few months: once at Raven Row Gallery and then again at FACT. The work is a collaboration between the artist and the Institute for Creative Technologies, a virtual reality research center which develops immersive therapy for war-veterans suffering from Post-traumatic Stress Disorder. It documents a group of ex soldiers as they relive their traumatic experiences suffered during the Iraq war, guided by a therapist who coaxes her subjects into retracing the specific emotional journey that gave rise to the original trauma. Its presented as a split screen installation, with once shot focusing on the virtual reality imagery and another taking in the exchange that occurs between the subject and the therapist. This method of display renders the title highly appropriate as it very much situates the viewer within the work and allows them also to observe the traumatic moment through the virtual reality simulation in tandem with the individual soldiers. The emotional journey of one particular solider had such intensity that I found myself shedding a few tears and mirroring his sensations of fear, helplessness and sadness as he experienced them.

The use of virtual reality for treatment of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is becoming increasingly common in the USA, partially for soldiers returning from war. This seems to be because the time and money needed for intensive person to person therapy is often unavailable so the government employs technology as a substitute. This blog has some interesting discussion on the topic http://www.noahshachtman.com/archives/002189.html and outlines some very pertinent arguments about how technology can be a blessing or a burden when it interfaces with the human body. Thanks to Somaya Langley http://www.criticalsenses.com/ who originally pointed me toward this study.

# 15 [26 June 2010]

This book looks interesting: Empathic Vision; Affect, Trauma and Contemporary Art. Its by Jill Bennett. I've grown a little weary of the 'mental health' terminology struggle and have decided to search for a new discourse with which to frame my thinking on 'emotional and psychological disturbance.'* So I am hoping this text might be useful, particularly as one of it's chapters is called "Insides, Outsides: Trauma, Affect and Art." Its one of the key texts which Lewis Biggs (director of Liverpool Biennial) gave as recommended reading for this year's festival. He says that it....

"takes the subject of Trauma (eg Holocaust, ethnic cleansing, N Ireland) as content,
but (is) most interesting for the arguments in favour of the priority of formal means (over
information / subject / representation) in producing affect and an adequate response
to the trauma through art."

I'm interested in this tension between form and content as recently I've been thinking a lot about how visual art often prioritises formal discourse over emotion and affect (see for example Lewis's use of the phrase "adequate response" ) I am not sure how relevant this line of thinking is going to be to the Group Therapy project, but I'm thinking that this book will probably help to give me some answers!

* This term borrowed from a recent email that I received from Andrew Bryant (thanks Andrew, its a good phrase). I've decided to use it instead of 'mental ill health' for the time being at least.

# 16 [6 July 2010]

Its been an intense couple of weeks and it seems that my focus has drifted slightly from this project to other seemingly more pressing matters. Last Tuesday saw me in London for a job interview, after which I decided to spend my afternoon in the pub with my London friends. The wine flowed a little too freely leading me to abandon my last train home in favor of another glass. It was a beautiful feeling arriving for work in Liverpool on Wednesday morning in yesterday's job interview clothes, especially on one of the hottest days of the year! But it was worth it, I have no regrets!

In general the world seems to be a brighter place then is was six months ago and I am pleased that I managed the very intense trip down South with no major panic attacks. Therapy seems to finally be helping me make some changes. Its probably the kind of stuff thats undetectable to anyone else, but for me its really important. Its amazing how learned behaviors that a person creates for themselves over the course of a lifetime can be so detrimental, but can build such a clear and incontrovertible image of what reality looks like. Its nice to begin to believe that I am actually living in a kinder world than the one that I had created for myself!

I attended a really nice dance and health session at the Bluecoat last night that was run by Liverpool Improvisation Collective. We practiced what the workshop leader called 'toweling:' a form of body therapy where one participant moves the other's limbs using a towel. Sounds very bizarre indeed, but having your limbs lifted and released with such a none invasive method of touch is a bit like floating in water. It left me feeling intensely relaxed! I'm also back in Wales for a day of Feldenkrais with Veronica this weekend. I'm hoping the weather holds out so that I can walk by the river afterwards.

So.... I will try to get back on topic with my next post. I'm becoming very aware that I need to expand my research methods in order to find other artists who I might potentially invite to the exhibition. I've got a great shortlist list at the moment, but it's probably not even half of a proper show.

# 17 [6 July 2010]

Oh and I forgot to mention....

I've dug out this exhibition catalogue for a Haywood touring exhibition that Jill Bennett mentions in her book Empathic Vision (see post from 24th June). It uses Trauma mostly in relation to a more collective awareness of national and international disasters from what I can tell so far...., but its got some pretty interesting artists in it such as Willie Doherty and Felix Gonzalez-Torres. I'll let you know how it is when I have had a proper read!

# 18 [9 July 2010]

I got very frustrated last weekend when I couldn't attend a seminar at the Arnolfini called The Lost Object: On Gesture and Psychoanalysis http://www.arnolfini.org.uk/whatson/events/details... due to work commitments. However thanks to the genius of the Arnolfini's marketing department there is now an audio recording of the first part of the afternoon available online which I have been pouring over this morning and am excited to report back on http://www.arnolfini.org.uk/downloads/LostObject71.... I am in the process of pestering the Arnolfini about getting the rest of the presentations online, particularly so that I can hear psychotherapist Professor Jeremy Holmes make his presentation.

The seminar referenced the exhibition Otto Zitko and Louise Bourgeois; Me, Myself and I, which has just closed at the Arnolfini. It focused specifically on the relationship between psychoanalysis and drawing but also explored wider themes of memory and the subconscious.

Tom Trevor director of the Arnolfini spoke first and discussed the curatorial process that fed into the exhibition. He brought up the very interesting fact that he had considered including Antonin Artaud's http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonin_Artaud drawings in the show alongside Zitko and Bourgeois. I have come across Artaud's drawings before but I did not know that many of them were made in the later stages of his life when he was very ill and having electroconvulsive therapy for what are retrospectively thought to be symptoms of schizophrenia. He's of particular interest to me for his writings on theatre and is someone to research at more at some point.

Next Ann Coxon Curator at Tate Modern read from her forthcoming book on Louise Bourgeois, making detailed mention of the artists insomnia drawings. As a lifelong insomniac I've always identified with this series of Bourgeois work and it's frenetic style. Coxon specifically drew comparison between these works and the process of meditation, noting that their consistent use of circular patterns and repetitive imagery mirrors a kind of rocking motion and the gentle attempt to lull oneself into sleep. One aspect of Bourgeois life that Coxon particularly foregrounded was her role as a mother. For some reason I had never imagined a woman like Bourgeois having children, but apparently she had three daughters and was famed for saying that a woman can only ever come to understand her own mother when she herself gives birth to children. I guess the cyclical implications of this make sense. A lot of Bourgeois work often portrays issues of nurturing and care, offset against anger and betrayal, which I can see now might express the duality of being both mother and daughter and understanding this difficult relationship from both perspectives.

So I am really hoping that the Arnolfini makes the second half of the seminar available and I can continue to chew over these presentations. From what I have heard so far they didn't really succeed in getting to the truely meaty psychoanalytical stuff but hopefully this happens later in the afternoon. To be continued.....!

# 19 [17 July 2010]

The term 'emotional and psychological disturbance' is taking me to interesting places.

I've been curled up with a vat of espresso and the latest edition of Mute magazine for the past half hour. I've stopped reading part way through an interview with artist Alexa Wright (interviewer Stefan Szczelkun) as there are a few passages in here which feel are worth documenting.

The interview touches on the theme of trauma and emotional affect, an area that I have been reading around quite extensively in the past week or so. There is discussion of Wright's work Killers made in 2002, which situates it's audience in solitary booths and plays back narratives of murders telling the real life stories of how they killed someone and how it made them feel. This is identified in the interview as a moment of transgression, where the viewer is forced to confront something beyond the normal experience of being human and to deal with their own hateful or empathetic response to these confessions.

There is a reference made to Kristeva here and her use of the term abject:

"According to Kristeva, what causes abjection is anything that disturbs our sense of identity, system or order. Anything, or perhaps anyone, that is in-between, ambiguous or composite."
Alexa Wright

The interview then brings in the theme of trauma which the interviewer describes as:

"An experience that overwhelms one's ordinary emotional abilities - something that is too difficult to process with the resources you have at that time."
Stefan Szczelkun

Killers takes the transgression of an excepted social norm to territories that encounter emotional extremity or trauma. Of course what it might also highlight is the level of emotional and psychological disturbance that lead to the murderous acts and the level of such disturbance that is translated to the viewer during their encounter with the work. We are in the realm of deviation where shock can equal disturbance and emotions that are are almost too difficult to process.

While the piece does not deal overtly with 'mental health' it seems to ask the viewer to consider the extremity of what the disturbed mind can conjure. Yet by instigating the moment of an intimate encounter between artwork and audience it also emphasises the fact that such grotesque acts generate from everyday human minds that function just like our own.

In its way the above is only speculation as I have not seen the work and have only read this single interview with Alexa Wright. But it been a useful read in terms of exploring trauma in the emotive encounter and the reconciling psychological extremes into the everyday. Here's a last quote from the artist:

"I am interested in exploring the fears and prejudices that set in when we are unable to establish a clear and tangible boundary between what we thing of as 'us', 'really normal' people and 'others'. Alexa Wright

All quotes taken from Stefan Szczelkun's interview with Alexa Wright in Mute Vol 2 Issue 16 http://www.metamute.org Listen to audio extracts from Alexa Wright's work Killers here: http://www.alteregoinstallation.co.uk/main_site/ki...

# 20 [29 July 2010]

I'd imagine its impossible to write a blog on the topic of art and mental health without eventually having to consider the practice of art as therapy. So I've come to Belfast his week to hook up with some old friends and to take part in some of the Northern Ireland Group for Art Therapy's summer school.

I have two aims for my time here

1) Find out what Art Therapy is and how it is practiced
2) Take part in some practical workshops and see if it works

So far the most compelling presentation on the practice of Art Therapy has been with a lady called Karen Huckvale who practices as an art therapist within the NHS in Devon and who is also an artist. Karen clearly approaches her work from a Jungian perspective as she made constant references to alchemy during her presentation. Jung saw artistic processes as accessing the subconscious through symbols and storytelling and thought that most human struggles originated in material stored in the subconscious.

She told a captivating story about an eleven year old girl with an abusive family history, with whom she had spent 30 hours separating glitter and sand in a process that seemed to be symbolic of transition and recovery. Her role as therapist was as a listener and a guide with the materials and art making acting as prompts for discussion and disclosure. This had clearly been a relationship where the development of trust was crucial with the art making providing a way of focusing feelings and images and providing shared goals.

Yesterday I also did my third three hour art therapy workshop with a group of six other women. I've been finding these sessions pretty tough going. Its amazing how four years of arts training has in some way damaged my most basic ability to make mess with materials and to be primitively and frantically creative. I could not in any way say that what I have produced has been part of my art practice..... but it has been oddly therapeutic. The pieces that I have made have been about my own experiences of my body, particularly focusing on heart and lungs. This has been stimulated by our workshop leader Saadia Parvez who has been leading us in a number of mediative and breathing techniques as well as more artistic and pictorial processes. Yesterday as a group of six women we all held hands and let out the most liberating and earth shattering scream as a way of rediscovering our voices and connecting with the energy in the group.

I've uploaded some of the images that I have produced so far. I feel a strange kind of embarrassment in doing this as they seem so naïve and unaccomplished!! But its also wonderful to rediscover that not everything that I produce has to be perfect and that not everything that I am not proud of has to remain a secret!!