BROADCAST A platform for open conversations
Conversations around women’s magazines with Bethany Slinn and Sarah Taylor Silverwood
BROADCAST Artist Sarah Taylor Silverwood has been working in various locations, connected through the Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, from secure units to drop-in sessions at Midlands Arts Centre. She invited a range of creative practitioners to collaborate in these settings to explore mental health experiences, including Kate Green, Bethany Slinn, Hannah Swingler and Emily Warner. BROADCAST was based around a series of questions that helped to navigate open conversations. These questions were developed with staff, participants and the collaborating artists as prompts for discussing mental health experiences. At the beginning of this project, there were many discussions around the idea that mental health can be hard to talk about. The project was framed around exploring the experience of mental health, though much of the focus was on developing sessions that were about making, and approaches that encourage a platform for conversation. This BROADCAST publication shares these conversations and participants’ work from the sessions. A new commission by Sarah Taylor Silverwood can be seen from the courtyard at MAC on the windows of the building. BROADCAST was commissioned in 2017 as part of the third BEDLAM arts and mental health festival.
Workshop with Bethany Slinn and Hannah Swinger
HOW DO YOU VISUALISE WHAT’S IN YOUR HEAD?
Fast Car it’s moving down a narrow lane the lane is in the countryside the lane moves from left to right left to right like a snake along the lane are more sports cars they are also moving fast
HOW DO YOU VISUALISE WHAT’S IN YOUR HEAD?
Without warning a box lid flies off quickly and the contents of my problem burst out, many colours, moving fast. Other boxes burst open and the contents mix with eath other in a jumble of colours. They start to swirl around me, above me and below me. I am surrounded, breathless, cowering and fearful, afraid that it will absorb me into itself and I will be lost forever.
Workshop with Bethany Slinn and Hannah Swinger
HOW DO PEOPLE TALK ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH?
WHAT IS A POSITIVE SPACE? WHAT IS A CHALLENGING SPACE
STS: Why were you drawn to take these photographs? Z: I took this picture because it’s complicated… it’s an emergency and it’s also helping you.
M: In this photo it’s pigeons, people, water, a lot going on, in competition with each other, who can get through first. This is a challenging space. Z: It’s desperation, they are looking for something, and they can’t find what they are looking for, and it’s the unknown. They are just searching for something. They don’t know what for.
M: It’s kind of disturbing when you look at it they are just stuck in one place they can’t move Z: For me it’s positive – it’s about knowing yourself, your deep rooted issues,
Z: This tree looks different to all the others. I was drawn to it. I was like ‘this tree is the one’ M: For me I like to be busy, and to keep my mind occupied. Z: Maybe I prefer to be in my own space and mind, that way I have clarity. I associate work with busy. So when it comes to tranquility I need a calm environment. To process.
Workshop with Sarah Taylor Silverwood Conversation between Sarah and two participants
is the only way you learn to grow
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO FEEL GOOD?
WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO FEEL BAD?
WHAT IS A POSITIVE SPACE? WHERE IS THE LIGHT? HOW CAN I SEE THIS SPACE IN A NEW WAY? KG: Photography is great for mental health because it’s about being present in the moment. Not thinking about tomorrow or yesterday. I am heavily involved in that moment. I don’t think anyone was thinking about much more than how to take a decent picture. We are using a process I developed called Pause, which is about pretending you’ve only got a film in your camera, letting your attention rest, not being
Photography Workshop with Kate Green at Secure Unit
bothered about who’s going to like it.
Photography Workshop with Kate Green at Secure Unit
Photography Workshop with Kate Green at Secure Unit
WHAT IS A POSITIVE SPACE? WHAT IS A CHALLENGING SPACE? EW: For this workshop around Designing Spaces, we focused on two opposing conditions - one being positive space (that was quite a wide and open term interpreted in many different ways) and the other being challenging space. STS: Were these drawings real or imagined spaces? EW: They were drawn from memory or they started off as memories of places, or rooms, or gardens. Most of these images represented positive spaces. EW: The process of recording can give a real insight into what impacts and affects a state of mind. This is an exercise in trying to record and note down everything that constitutes a space - doors, windows, furniture, light, objects, personal belongings, but also thinking about the layout. I wanted to keep it quite abstract because it gave room for some interesting interpretations and reflections afterwards. So in some of them there are little L symbols - these were doorways or
Designing Spaces Workshop with Emily Warner at Secure Unit Conversation between Sarah Taylor Silverwood and Emily Warner
entrances in and out.
EW: The top bit of this image was a depiction of how someone perceives a claustrophobic and uncomfortable space - packed, dense and quite restrictive.
Big Brother House
EW: Then we began to design some more 3D spaces. There was a need for balance, and we chatted about the way that things are in flux and there are a whole number of variables and factors that cause influence and affect how we feel about a space.
Comfort is really important to positivity - so the assault course has warm water. Physical comfort is important and the things that pose challenges more often than not are the people that would potentially be in that space. The negotiations between people. So in the Big Brother house, the space is a positive space but it is the people that make it challenging.
Challenges can be positive and a positive space can have challenges.
Somebody said that the assault course is a positive space because it is a place that allows adventure even though there is a physical challenge.
There is a sense of exclusivity in a few of them, so the barbecue was for a specific group of invited people - invited space is a personal environment where there is an element of control. In the Big Brother house you have no control over who is in there which was challenging.
Designing Spaces Workshop with Emily Warner at Secure Unit Conversation between Sarah Taylor Silverwood and Emily Warner
Assault Course
BBQ Area
WHY IS IT HARD TO TALK ABOUT SOME THINGS?
WHAT QUESTION WOULD YOU LIKE TO ASK ABOUT MENTAL HEALTH?
WHAT OBJECT REPRESENTS YOUR IDENTITY? WHAT IS A POSITIVE SPACE?
Workshop with Kate Green at Secure Unit
HOW DOES LANGUAGE AFFECT YOU? WHAT IS BEAUTY?
Š Sarah Taylor Silverwood 2017 Commissioned by Midlands Arts Centre as part of BEDLAM Festival. Thanks to all the participants and staff at Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust, Kate Green, Bethany Slinn, Hannah Swingler and Emily Warner. Designed by Keith Dodds Illustrations by Sarah Taylor Silverwood mac birmingham, Cannon Hill Park, Birmingham, B12 9QH Sales & Information: 0121 446 3232 www.macbirmingham.co.uk
With thanks to all participants: Stephen Des Carl Peter AndrĂŠ Baden Gurmel Zeynab Annette Sarah Stephen Emmanuel Mehrban Mary Agnes Phil Bill Lak Steve Lloyd Nicola Lena Katy Megan Hannah Sam Lucy Anne Jane