The Beast Within
My work has been titled 'The Beast Within' in order to give the audience a rough idea of what my work is about. When they see the images they will understand that I don't physically have an animal or something inside, but the beast is a metaphor for my mind, or at least something that's not tangible.
By calling my mental illness a beast, it provokes the feelings of rage and cruelty, which is what I feel the 'beast' is. It's also not too obvious, I think that by calling is something like 'The Anxiety Within' it would be too obvious and it wouldn't captivate an audience as much because they don't need to engage their minds.
By calling my mental illness a beast, it provokes the feelings of rage and cruelty, which is what I feel the 'beast' is. It's also not too obvious, I think that by calling is something like 'The Anxiety Within' it would be too obvious and it wouldn't captivate an audience as much because they don't need to engage their minds.
'The Beast Within' also sounds rather poetic. It's elegant and cruel at the same time, which is how I feel the images translate.
I've been having a play around with how I could present my work. I must work around the restraints of not having much space to display my work. This probably means limiting the amount of images that I can show, so I have to pick the ones that I feel represent myself best.
Here are my options that I've come up with;
1. Key Points
- I like the way that the two end photos lean in together to meet the middle photo, it makes the images work not only individually but as a whole
- The middle photo is confident which represents the 'beast within' emerging from the darkness
- The end photos contrast against this because it shows the parts of me that bows down to the power of the confident, strong evil parts of me because it is more powerful than the rest of me.
- There's a strong contrast between power and weakness
- The lack of face removes my identity, not only representing my feeling of lost identity but also allowing a viewer to put themselves into the image if they relate to these feelings.
2. Key Points
- Shows three images that represent anxiety rather than having them bow down to a more powerful version of themselves
- There's a lot of weird body shapes to engage a viewer
- You can tell that the bodies are all the same person and they show kind of the same thing - is there need for all three photos?
- The lack of face removes my identity, not only representing my feeling of lost identity but also allowing a viewer to put themselves into the image if they relate to these feelings.
3. Key Points
- The two images on the side have more blur to them and so the eye is drawn towards the image in the middle which feel more 'correct' to the eye as there's more definition
- I like how the image on the right seems to be walking out of the frame away from the middle photo
- The different mix of imagery challenges the eye but also perhaps makes you ignore the side photos
- The lack of face removes my identity, not only representing my feeling of lost identity but also allowing a viewer to put themselves into the image if they relate to these feelings.
4. Key Points
- Rather than a triptych we have a diptych
- The images have cut out the middle one from presentation 3, and so there is no in focus image for the eye to be drawn towards
- The image on the left seems to be walking away from that on the right, representing the abandonment of the self that I feel
- The lack of face removes my identity, not only representing my feeling of lost identity but also allowing a viewer to put themselves into the image if they relate to these feelings.
5. Key Points
- Visually pleasing to to the rough symmetry - the bending over vs bending backwards
- Represents the feelings of weakness, lack of control and torment.
- Very raw in feeling due to the nakedness
- The lack of face removes my identity, not only representing my feeling of lost identity but also allowing a viewer to put themselves into the image if they relate to these feelings.
6. Key Points
- The butt is just a bit too prominent in this triptych that that's directly where the eyes fall and so the viewer almost disregards the rest of the set.
- It does show great pain and frustration
7. Key Points
- Far removed from the naked images
- The face is only partly hidden, which creates mystery but also makes it so that a viewer can't imaging anybody else in that dress. Not a problem if I don't want to share these feelings with others
- Use of the dress represents an outside beauty that is conflicted by an internal darkness
- The use of the dress as a mask represents this idea of hiding the truth with a false beauty
8. Key Points
- I'm not sure both images are needed as they seem to represent the same kind of thing
- the many arms and hands represents the monster that's within and that's hiding under human clothes that show beauty, almost like a veil that can't be seen past.
- It's kind of unnatural to look at, capturing an audience by showing them something that they're not used to.
9. Key Points
Other people's thoughts;
Most people seemed torn when I asked them which represented the feeling of anxiety and there being a powerful beast inside. It was usually either option 1 or 2, and one said option 3. I asked people close and not so close to me to get a better idea of how different people understood the images.
- Much more mythical and fantasy-like than the other options due to the interaction with the butterflies and the fog creating mystery
- I'm not sure how these represent my anxiety as more
- Extremely visually pleasing to me, The cool tones and the white make for something very ghostly.
Other people's thoughts;
Most people seemed torn when I asked them which represented the feeling of anxiety and there being a powerful beast inside. It was usually either option 1 or 2, and one said option 3. I asked people close and not so close to me to get a better idea of how different people understood the images.
Final thoughts;
After looking at all of these options, i've made a decision. I'll mix option 1 and 2 to create the below;
After looking at all of these options, i've made a decision. I'll mix option 1 and 2 to create the below;
This option still has the intense feelings of leaning towards the powerful, more confident self that may be the beast within, while having a stronger element of pain and mental trauma that option 1 did due to the addition of the image on the right.
I like the way the light is more powerful and strong on the central image because it highlights that feeling of confidence and power, whereas the other two images are slightly duller as they represent the weaker parts of myself that aren't as visible .
The middle image represents two versions of myself;
a. The 'Beast Within' - the darker parts of my mind that take over and rule over the more rational and 'sane' parts of myself, it pushes the healthy mind to the side and instead causes pain and trauma. She's a monster but she's strong and her confidence and forcefulness is hard to reckon with.
and b. the masked version of myself that hides the beast, that presents a face of confidence even when my mind is buckling and I feel like i'm not working. It's the masquerade of 'yeah i'm just stressed aha' or 'yeah i just didn't sleep much last night' when asked if you're okay. The masked version of myself has been here for years because the beast has told me there's no point torturing others with a sob story of how my mind is ill.
I think that this centre image creates a whole narrative for the triptych in general, which is why I didn't go with option 2. Option 2 felt like they were all saying and representing the same thing - the anxiety and the feeling of mental pain. If this is the case, why is a triptych needed?
I believe that with this presentation of work, the three images are strong on their own but together they create an even stronger whole piece that creates a narrative in the way that they're positioned and have differing moods to them.
All of these people are me, but they feel like different segments of myself. I feel that this is visually interesting while also allowing both myself and others to understand how my mind works. I believe with mental health issues on the rise with a government that doesn't see the urgency of mental health support, many viewers will relate to this on some level. After all, i'm not the only one who has bad days.
I think that not only am I presenting this as a way of understanding myself, it's a way to put myself out there and visually translate what I and others feel, a mark of visibility for mental illness and let others who are going through a dark time know that there is an understanding of what they're going through on an emotional level.
It is mostly about me, of course. I wouldn't have been able to create this work if I hadn't gone through so many bad mental moments. The work visually articulates my life, my feelings and my mind however with 1 in 6 adults in the UK battling some sort of mental illness weekly, and 1 in 5 have considered taking their own life, it's clear that i'm not alone in these feelings despite the overwhelming feeling of isolation.
Now that the main body of the work has been finalised, I can start to think about the supporting work; the instax images.
I still wasn't sure whether to use these in my final wall presentation because it may have ruined the mysterious and immersive feeling of the triptych, however I made some mockups on photoshop to see how they'd fit in;
Personally, I don't like any of these. I think that the polaroids are interfering with the main body of the work just too much, it removes the immersiveness which I think it important to the triptych because that's what gives it that extra sense of mystery and darkness. The bright colours and the white clash with that idea, and is far too distracting.
Out of all four of these, the bottom option is probably my favourite because it represents a hectic mind, however the people i've asked have opted for the top one or none at all.
To make these mock ups I also used a dark grey / black background because the walls i'll be hanging them on will be black, and so I thought i'd see how they'd look both on the wall and over the photos, but I love how the darkness of the images bleed out into the walls - that's why I chose to have no borders. The polaroids disrupts this.
Instead, i've opted for a small photo album to accompany the main body of work, almost like a subchapter.
I like the way the light is more powerful and strong on the central image because it highlights that feeling of confidence and power, whereas the other two images are slightly duller as they represent the weaker parts of myself that aren't as visible .
The middle image represents two versions of myself;
a. The 'Beast Within' - the darker parts of my mind that take over and rule over the more rational and 'sane' parts of myself, it pushes the healthy mind to the side and instead causes pain and trauma. She's a monster but she's strong and her confidence and forcefulness is hard to reckon with.
and b. the masked version of myself that hides the beast, that presents a face of confidence even when my mind is buckling and I feel like i'm not working. It's the masquerade of 'yeah i'm just stressed aha' or 'yeah i just didn't sleep much last night' when asked if you're okay. The masked version of myself has been here for years because the beast has told me there's no point torturing others with a sob story of how my mind is ill.
I think that this centre image creates a whole narrative for the triptych in general, which is why I didn't go with option 2. Option 2 felt like they were all saying and representing the same thing - the anxiety and the feeling of mental pain. If this is the case, why is a triptych needed?
I believe that with this presentation of work, the three images are strong on their own but together they create an even stronger whole piece that creates a narrative in the way that they're positioned and have differing moods to them.
All of these people are me, but they feel like different segments of myself. I feel that this is visually interesting while also allowing both myself and others to understand how my mind works. I believe with mental health issues on the rise with a government that doesn't see the urgency of mental health support, many viewers will relate to this on some level. After all, i'm not the only one who has bad days.
I think that not only am I presenting this as a way of understanding myself, it's a way to put myself out there and visually translate what I and others feel, a mark of visibility for mental illness and let others who are going through a dark time know that there is an understanding of what they're going through on an emotional level.
It is mostly about me, of course. I wouldn't have been able to create this work if I hadn't gone through so many bad mental moments. The work visually articulates my life, my feelings and my mind however with 1 in 6 adults in the UK battling some sort of mental illness weekly, and 1 in 5 have considered taking their own life, it's clear that i'm not alone in these feelings despite the overwhelming feeling of isolation.
Now that the main body of the work has been finalised, I can start to think about the supporting work; the instax images.
I still wasn't sure whether to use these in my final wall presentation because it may have ruined the mysterious and immersive feeling of the triptych, however I made some mockups on photoshop to see how they'd fit in;
Out of all four of these, the bottom option is probably my favourite because it represents a hectic mind, however the people i've asked have opted for the top one or none at all.
To make these mock ups I also used a dark grey / black background because the walls i'll be hanging them on will be black, and so I thought i'd see how they'd look both on the wall and over the photos, but I love how the darkness of the images bleed out into the walls - that's why I chose to have no borders. The polaroids disrupts this.
Instead, i've opted for a small photo album to accompany the main body of work, almost like a subchapter.
I've ordered them in a way that shows a narrative of the mind progressively getting worse, until it ends up with the nude shot in the woods that the main body of work is from. The final image is simply just black, showing emptiness, isolation, and a lack of being.
This is visible in the way the room progressively gets messier, and the face becomes more worn. It's almost like a visual diary of how this project came to be, with the images from the main shoots being towards the end as the mind gets bad - the shoots are a reaction to bad mental health and you can see the journey of okay to bad through the polaroids.
Alongside the main body and the polaroids, I will also be presenting some smaller images from previous shoots in a portfolio box. If this were an exhibition I would have had them small, and perhaps hanging from the ceiling. This would show that they're the supporting work that also discover the experiences of somebody in a bad mental state, and it would show that the work is important but not the main body.
These images show progression of the mind as well as my photographic journey.
I am really happy with how the final presentation, even though it's far from where I thought it would end up. At first I wanted to go heavy with the fantasy route, and while I still like the idea, that path just wasn't the one to be taken for this project. Instead, I have something so much more raw and true to my self, that still look beautiful.
I think over the course of this project my work has been most heavily inspired by Dragana Jurisic and Francesca Woodman, as well as the concepts of the masquerade and performance noted in many of my research books.
Dragana Jurisic gave me a new way to look at work, introducing the ideas of chapters, interesting presentation ideas, and concepts of feeling lost. While our works differ largely, I have taken great inspiration from her as an artist. She documents her struggles and her past, which gave me confidence to do so myself.
The work of Francesca Woodman has helped me dramatically by teaching me that not all of my images need to be visually perfect or extravagant - sometimes a blur and a naked body can say far more than an in focus and clothed image - in my case anyway. I also really like the way she plays with the concept of time and being, as well as also exploring her mind. I've tried to do this too, influenced by Woodman, but in my own way.
The Beast Within is me, and i'm presenting myself raw to the world. In a way, perhaps it's become some sort of self-therapy where I have come to accept and understand myself, and the act of sharing this is that way of accepting that I have a beast.
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