Self-Apparatus (2023)

Artist Statement:

Self-Apparatus is a visual response to mental health issues prevalent in today's society, where I am hoping to raise awareness of this silent, deadly killer within today's youth that is becoming increasingly diagnosed with more mental disorders. The photographs provide a self-portrait portraying the internal landscape. This is a very personal series, as I have struggled with mental health, specifically severe social anxiety and depression, throughout my teens. I have had constant battles with myself and my self-worth due to my autoimmune disease (myasthenia gravis) and bullying because of my appearance. My mental health got to a certain point where I was hoping I didn't wake up in the morning. Not eating when the bullying got out of control. I chose to use scientific apparatus because mental health and mental illnesses are medical issues, so to bring in the scientific apparatus creates a scene of medical situations and scenarios, including attending therapy. Mental health can morph and manipulate the individual's perception of themselves and how others around them view them. Using the apparatus with water creates a strong and unsettling layer between the audience and the individual in the image, demonstrating how mental health can seem to the person suffering in silence. By placing my subjects who all suffer from different forms of mental health behind the apparatus, we are able to see an altered reality, as if mental anxiety has a mind of its own and can alter how we believe we are seen by others. The faces being morphed add to this as it is a visual representation of how mental health can manipulate the individual's perceptions as they engage with the outside world. The dark aesthetic and blue palette I have employed, have the ability to create an uneasy atmosphere on viewing, using specific lighting to create a sad and dark place, representing an internal landscape of what it's like to be in the mind of an individual who is suffering.