Me: Hello! I was wondering if I could ask you a series of questions for my dissertation and use you as a case study? It would be about art as therapy, how it's helped to support you and where you are now in your practice. I would love to include you in my work!
Bert: Absolutely, I would love to! Thank you so much for thinking of me for this. Let me know how you want the answers (I'm fine with written or a recorded call) and I will get it done asap.
- Can you tell me a little bit about your background in the visual arts?
I have always had an interest in visual art, but it was only at 28 years old I felt able to go back into education and learn the skills and discipline required to be a working artist. Throughout my time in education, I was able to experiment and explore, allowing myself to figure out what type of art worked for me and what I needed more practise in. For my final project at University, I created a magazine that would help me put all my skills and passion into, which has led to my website Shook.
- How would you describe your practice?
I am a multidisciplinary visual communicator. That basically means that I use a lot of different mediums to communicate with people from all over the world. From my website, to my instagram, self portraiture, digital art, poetry, writing and more. I use my skills in videography, photography, editing, illustration, character creating and communication to connect with others and try to express myself in the process. Most of my work is around mental wellbeing, unconditional love and helping people to express themselves, including myself.
- What are you currently working on and what plans do you have for your future practice?
I run my website Shook (not very well as it is a lot of work for one person), I also am learning how to model and do self portrait photography. For the future, I plan to open my own photography studio, but it will be with a twist. I want the place to make every single person who walks into feel comfortable and be able to photograph them in a way that showcases them as the awesome, truly individual person they are. I also want Shook to expand, with more people working alongside me, giving people a safe space to express themselves in any way they want to.
- I love following your posts on Instagram. You post daily affirmations to yourself and your message is clear: self acceptance and self love are crucial. What prompted you to have this mindset and post it publicly?
I was told I had a pituitary tumour and multiple small tumours on my thyroid in 2019, then lockdown happened. I was miserable, feeling incredibly down and out about myself, when I realised that what I actually needed was to send all the love and acceptance I have for everyone else back to myself. I had read a lot about it, but had never really put it into practise. I started with small things, like wearing clothes I wanted around the house, instead of what I thought was acceptable for my body or experimenting with makeup. I spent time finding the things that I loved to do, such as listening to 90’s music and dancing on the bed, putting glitter in my hair, walking in the countryside or lying upside down and trying to headbang to metal music.
Then in April 2020, we were in the middle of lockdown and I realised my body was changing, but because I had a specific image in my head, I found it hard to actually recognise myself. So I started taking the self portraits, first in the mirror, but over time I saw just how much of a positive impact this was having on me, I was able to see myself from a more realistic angle, seeing parts of me that I wouldn’t normally see.
This all helped me to realise that I wasn’t this ugly monster I had made myself out to be in my head, I was just a regular woman, not good, not bad, not perfect, not flawed. Just a woman who had spent so much energy, time and money to fit in to what society wanted, when in reality I was so much happier using all those resources to fit into what I wanted, into a life I liked.
So I visualised it, I made myself a moodboard which tracks where I have been, where I want to go and what I want to do. I add to it or take away, as needed. But over time I have added photographs of myself and post-it notes reminding me of how far I have come and just what I am capable of.
My decision to publicly post this journey was two-fold, part of it was to keep a visual record for myself, so I can go back and track myself and remember what I have been able to do throughout one of the worst parts of my life. Then the other part is I want to show the world that there are people like me, that regular women can be radical in their approach to the world, that we are unique and that we are so incredibly amazing. Because the world tells us from a very early age that we are not, but if enough women realise they are, we are unstoppable!
- Do you find that being creative benefits your mood and your mental health? If so, in which way(s) does it help you?
Creativity is the ultimate balm for me. I cannot and will not ever live without it in my life. No matter what I do, I always want to do it with that creative flare!
When I am feeling anxious I tend to sit in front of my mirror and experiment with make up or my hair. This is because I have to be completely present, I can’t let my mind slip and be distracted by my anxiety, so instead I allow myself to channel it, to bring it out in the make up or hair.
I also have a tendency to always have a side project going on, so if I overstimulated with instagram, taking photographs and worked too much on my website, I will turn to one of these projects. Examples of these projects are, making mood boards, redesigning a sleeveless denim jacket into a frilly, bright, tasselled coat, revamping a vintage bike, making myself a mic holder out of a tube with my name painted on or learning to rollerskate.
I also love to write. This could be poetry, a small essay or trying to get on with writing on my novel. These works may not be seen by anyone, but they are a channel for me to express and work through my emotional and mental states.
- How often do you like to be creative? Have you found that the more you are creative, the better you feel?
I find that I am always creative in one way or another most days, even if it's just experimenting with my food. I just don’t seem to be able to not be creative. But I do find that when I feel particularly low, when I allow myself to just be creative for no other reason than to enjoy the process (which is something a lot of working artists struggle to do) I find myself feeling lighter, more open to talking about my issues and also just happier that I have created something I like.
- Has there been a particular time when things weren't good in your life that art was a therapy for you to work out your thoughts and feelings? What happened? Was it a transformative moment for you?
Five years ago I suffered from a mental breakdown due to a family death. I was unable to move past it and it triggered a lot of trauma from my childhood. I decided to use my art to experiment with the pop culture surrounding mental wellbeing and mindfulness, to see if it would be of use for me and what it could bring to my art.
I found that the use of Mindfulness when applied from a scientific standpoint was helpful, but when it was watered down and became part of the mainstream culture, it became a far more toxic place and a commodity.
This is when I started to use my art as a place to allow people and myself to express themselves, through words, art and sound to help with their wellbeing. It was a moment of clarity that art is vital to us all and this needs to be shown to the world instead of packaged and sold as an easy list of things to achieve or be productive with.
- Is there a particular method of working, using a certain material or process for example, that is more therapeutic to you? Why is this?
I am quite methodical in my process a lot of the time, I can be bogged down by small detail and become overwhelmed. So over the last year I have been working on allowing myself to be more free and less specific in my process, especially with the self portraiture.
I rarely have more than a simple idea of what colour I want it to be and allow it to free flow. This has helped me to experiment and develop my skills in make up artistry, modelling and photography. This allows me to express what I am feeling in the moment, so change my persona, face shape or how my body looks.
- Do you practice mindfulness, meditation, or anything else to help reduce your stress? Have you encountered a positive response?
I practice written therapy. This primarily consists of me keeping a journal that I write in when I need to, to help get down how I feel, what is going on in my little world and actually put down the words that I cannot say to other people. I do also write poetry, slogans, essays and stories which are all part of this process, but are sometimes less personal, so I share them.
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