“We get a feeling that there is a reoccurring theme in some of your works regarding mental illness, specifically depression. Can you tell us a little bit about that?”
Mental illness is something I have been struggling with for a while, especially self-harm and depression. And there has always been that feeling of being stuck in something reoccurring.
Would you say that being able to express it is a form of release?
Painting subjects around those themes was/is not hard for me, but there is a process in which I have to confront deep emotions that are not easy to confront. And every time I finish a painting, I am like ‘now it’s out there. I think that one of the things that I have been most afraid of since I was a child, is being seen, being observed. I have been isolated and lonesome. I think that depression is a very lonesome thing. I mean the people surrounding you help you, but you must face it alone. Being able to show people that fight is particularly important to me.
Do you think that your work will help other people in the same situation?
I hope so. I feel like my representation of mental illness is important, and I have seen people observe my paintings trying to analyze them and they have had to go through the thoughts that go behind the painting, showing them the reality of how it is and how ugly it can be. I think that the issue right now with mental illness is that we have gone from it being completely taboo, to a kind of glamorization of it on social media. I don’t get it. I don’t understand why some people would want to glamourize something so painful as depression.
Depression is awful, it hurts, it doesn’t only hurt you it hurts everyone that surrounds you and I just hope people realize that. I also hope that if you have these thoughts within you and that you are not capable or have the strength to express them, I hope that my paintings resonate with you at least.
We not only see this in your paintings but also in some of your photography?
Yes, it’s a hard subject to get away from for me, even if it is in a lighter form. I think that the subject that links all of my art, is pure intense emotions because that’s how I feel.
I am hypersensitive to my emotions, to life, to everything and this is my interpretation of them and yes it is ugly sometimes, yes it is intense and yes it is powerful.
There is a lot of beautiful work as well!
I think that there is satisfaction in being able to create something beautiful out of something awful and dark. I wouldn’t call my paintings ugly but I would say that they are hard to observe.
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